The curly girl

When I was a little one, a very little one, I had a head full of curls that shined auburn in the sunlight and stuck out in all directions. One of these curls fell from the centre of my head, at the hairline, right down my forehead, entirely naturally. So people took to reciting the nursery rhyme when they saw me:
there once was a little girl
who had a little curl
right in the centre of her forehead.
and when she was good
she was very very good
and when she was bad
she was horrid.

When I was about three, I had had enough of hearing all this, over and over again, and so I got the biggest scissors I could find from my mother's drawer and after a little perspiration cut the curl clean off. I looked at my reflection in the mirror and felt regret for the first time. Yikes, as it lay in my hand. My distinguishing mark.

When people saw the curl gone, they were shocked, but then they just said oh well, and got on with it. This was what got me the most. The oh well, and getting on with it. I think I expected the nation to have a suitable mourning period and then we could get on with it, maybe a week later when we had all cried and cried and loved together (or whatever my three year old sense of things dreamed up). The curl never grew back.

and when she was good she was very very good
and when she was bad,

she was horrid.