We need to be repulsed only to be attracted by something else. One doesn’t exist without the other. But revulsion and fascination may go hand in hand. Instantly, simultaneously, in a parallel fashion. Hair set in an unnatural context often linked those two frameworks. Hairballs found in animal stomachs were considered talismans. They were fetishes possessing magic powers. Beyond causing nausea.
Circumstances of our revulsion also play a relevant role here. In Romani culture, such bundles of hair and bone, allegedly found in homes some Roma women visited, were believed to be objects planted to bring disaster to the residents. To stave off bad fortune, there was only one remedy: the blasted abomination you’re now looking at had to be removed. Like there was but a single worry, contrary to Leo Tolstoy’s famous opening passage in Anna Karenina: “All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way” (trans. Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky).
This time around I wasn’t supposed to talk about unhappy families, so let’s get a move on. Follow me through the slippery corridors of the room of disgust.
