It's not always fun

Mrs. Holly strolled into my office one morning with a little friend in tow. Her always bright smile and friendly demeanor seemed a little forced. Her eyes were wide as she calmly said, “T says he got a hair cut last night.”

Now Mrs. Holly was our specialist for teaching students with emotional disabilities. And the little boy with her was usually in some kind of trouble in the classroom.

We all sat down and I took a good look at the child. He looked up at me expectantly. “T, what a nice hair…cut.” His hair was trimmed, but…wait. What? There, all the way around his head, was a finely edged one-eighth inch wide cut into his scalp!

I stared at this, just trying to comprehend what I was seeing. I looked at Mrs. Holly; I had this intense urge to scream. “Who did this to him!!?” Her eyes held mine steadily as she went on.

“T tells me his uncle cut his hair because he was naughty.”

I followed her lead, checked the note of hysteria in my voice, and asked T who had cut his hair.

In his little first grade, front-teeth-missing lisp, he replied, “My uncle cutted my hair, and it hurted.”

Could this be right? We continued our discussion of the previous evening and the horror continued. The chaotic scene T described was at times unbelievable mayhem of aunts, uncles, mom, cousins coming and going and saying nonsensical things, and sometimes just confused childish story telling. I really couldn’t get a grip on what had actually happened.

All I knew is that SOMEONE had CUT THIS CHILD’S HEAD!

What could we do but report it to social services? Mrs. Holly called mom, but of course, could not reach her. Or ANY of the names or phone numbers on his emergency contact list. This was the 16th time my school had called social services on this family.

Two weeks later, I received a response. “No evidence of child neglect or abuse. Claim unfounded.”