Every five years, I molt. I have this old skin that tends to shed and that process takes me to deepest ends of pain. I realize somewhere along the way that I am shedding the version of me that I used to know towards the end. It always gets me unaware. Do you ever get this? Do you ever see the signs?

I do not know what you call it in your life but mine feels like, what I think a crab goes through when it outgrows it’s old hard body and has to get out of it so that new shell can grow. Just google it if you have never seen this process, it’s fascinating. Could it have anything to do with being a cancer season baby, with a crab for a sign? Maybe, just maybe, we live in a mysterious world.

The signs you ask,well, it always starts with being uncomfortable. What used to give me joy no longer does it for me. It is mostly external things like where I work, sometimes friends, how I dress, what I give my time to and so on. They feel like a chore, like being a shark in a pond. So so uncomfortable I carry around a dark cloud for days on end.

Then it goes to the hair. It becomes a burden and I shave it which always seems the most reasonable idea. The more people tell me how good the hair looks and condemn me for wanting to shave it, the more I just want it out of my system. This happened in 2004, 2009, 2014, 2019 and the other day I was so sure I wanted to shave. I ended up doing the most absurd unlike me thing instead, micro-blading. It’s like getting a tattoo for eyebrows and I also put on semi permanent lashes. I have never done this but it felt as extreme as shaving so that stays, sort of a replacement.

In 2005, I was joining class eight. This is when most girls are at their prettiest as they realize the effect they have on the opposite gender and like the attention that comes with it. What did I do, I came back from the holidays bald headed to the laughter of my classmates and teachers alike. I have good hair and tends to be long even if it’s hard and kinky, so people could not understand why. It was a new beginning for me. I had decided the only reason I was staying home when every cell in me wanted out so bad was an education and I would change the story for once in my family. So I sacrificed my hair for that.

Then 2009 after almost a year out of high school, I got to go back and went bald again. I was so tall and skinny with a long neck, the stares and giggles said it all. It did not make sense for anyone but it always made so much significance for me. It’s like the sign that revitalizes my senses to go for that thing that is out of reach. Sort of baptism by shaving.

2014, I was wondering why nothing was making any sense, I would wake up and go to my menial work daily and always be short of rent of Ksh. 2000. I was not wasteful, I was not a spendthrift, so why was it not adding up? This time, I just did a low trim and fasted for 40 days taking water and very little food at supper when I was too weak.

2019 same thing, I was travelling the world, the organisation I had founded was getting some recognition but I was so lost. Like watching yourself instead of participating in your journey. How would people understand that I would be sleeping and wake up crying for no reason in a beautiful room in Vancouver, Canada. It seemed like I was not appreciative. So I chopped of my locks as it even became painful touching my scalp.

The pattern though has always been a big change waiting to happen.

This time you have somewhat of a front row seat, I invite you, I am nice like that. Though you may need to know that it’s like planting a seed and by the time we are eating the fruits, since it’s me and you now, it will be the next molting season. Maybe you will see it before I do. Either way, the new shell will be beautiful to witness but hard to let go of the former one. Welcome to this new one I am growing into with my new eyebrows and lashes for giggles.