The Dithering of a District Diva

In the Fall of 2005 — my senior year at Hampton University — I went to my aunt the beautician to have my hair cut off. She refused. “You’re always complaining about your hair not growing like you want it to…I am NOT cutting off your hair!” She said to me. So, I grabbed some regular old Elmer’s scissors and went to town on my own hair. I cut it within an inch of its life…and it looked a terrible trip. But, at least, I was free.

I had wanted to wear my hair in its natural state since senior year of high school, but I was worried about what people would think and whether I would get a job. But, I hated my hair straight; it fell so flat on my head in comparison to the regal afro that my mother sported in her younger days that was immortalized in pictures hanging all over our house. Natural hair was so beautiful to me, but everything around me told me that nappy was ugly.  Sesame Street wasn’t rocking like this when I was growing up:

And then, in the Fall of 2005, I just didn’t care anymore.  I didn’t care if anyone liked it, I didn’t care what it represented to anyone else, I didn’t care that my boyfriend at the time HATED it.  I just knew that I could not remember what my natural hair felt like in my hands, and that broke my heart.  I wanted it back.  I was suddenly — and unexpectedly — free of everything in me that was holding me back from experiencing my God-given hair. I don’t recall the date, because I didn’t make a big to-do about it.  I just did it. (And then I had my friend Mickey do an emergency kinky twist, since I cut it without having any real plan as to what I was going to do with it next.) I wore it in kinky twists and braids for about a year to let my hair grow out, and I’ve been rocking it ever since.

The most wonderful thing about wearing my hair natural has been walking downtown in Atlanta and D.C. and having complete strangers become instant comrades, as we compare products and techniques and exchange compliments.  The most interesting thing about being naptural is the comments I’ve received from other people.  Grown women have asked if they can “touch” my hair; I’ve been told by an associate at a law firm that if I wanted a job there, I would straighten my hair (umm, I didn’t, and I don’t work there); But my favorite comment thus far has been from another Black sista who straightens:  “If you don’t straighten your hair but you put all the make-up in the world, are you still natural????”  She was just curious.  My side-eye looked a bit like this:

Courtesy of The PBG at dirtyprettythangs.com

(We’re just gonna lift her up in prayer and keep it moving).

As India.Aire says: “I am not my hair” — but my hair is so me.  I love everything about it and everything that I can do to it.  When I want it straight, I straighten it. When I want a fro, I’ll fro it out. When I want it kinky-curly, I’ll twist it up and set it free. I pin it up, puff it out, braid it down, slick it back, WHATEVER I want to do with it, gets done.

To those that don’t like it, I’m sorry for them. To those that feel threatened by it, ummm…just, why? It doesn’t signify that I’m going to start a revolution against you. I don’t associate it with being “in touch” with my blackness, as I reject and denounce any suggestion that we are such a monolithic community that there is only one genuine “Black” experience. All it means to me is that I am fascinated by the way God made my hair grow out of the top of my head.  I love it, and I love Him for it. And I wouldn’t trade it in for the world.  Cue Willow!

Natural Hair Mafia!

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