Say that ten times; each command with a different sound, accent, attitude, eye roll or head tilt. Natural Black hair is back in the news. CNN published an article about touching our hair. Oh, my here we go again. The debate rages on; extremes on both ends, ranging from the early disgusting years of America to letting folks enjoy a cultural experience.
The article was distressing and many of the comments on the article were unfortunate. I’ve been natural for 10 years and … so what. I’m not all that in to me. Since going natural, I’ve done the wash and go to flat iron straight to some weirdness in between. I’ve received compliments and, “Do somethin’ with yo hair.” comments from my husband and sister. My twin sister rocks all sorts of natural do’s. She’s a bit more daring than I and I think she has cooler hair.
My hair sometimes speaks volumes about how I feel. For the last two years, it was sad ‘cause I was stressed over a racial issue. It’s resolved and I feel free from the situation. Free! I finally listened to my sister and another natural mom that I had a conversation with this weekend. After Karate class, I raced home and washed my hair. I spent about an hour twisting and super moisturizing with a coconut oil and African shea butter blend. I wore the twists to work the last two days wearing a half bandana scarf thing ‘cause my parts were all messed up. My sister told me she just grabs hair and twists, no parts - duly noted. I have not done the twists in years because I didn’t want to deal with the tangles.
While driving home from work today, I untwisted my hair and didn’t give two honks about who watched the curls unfurl. When I got home, I studied it and ended up putting a leather butterfly hair clip at the top to keep it out my face. I’m looking forward to tomorrow with my bouncin’ and misbehavin’ tresses. If my friends want to touch it, I won’t mind if they don’t mind, super moisturized fingers. Anybody else want to touch? Well, let’s just say, I’m the boss of my space and if I’m not feelin’ it, you ain’t either.
