Hair-raising Issues

To be or "knot" to be...that is the question

Usually I’m not this topical, preferring to rant about the personal rather than the public, but the stars – and the media – converged when I found that yesterday was apparently National Real Hair Day.  According to Tyra Banks, at least, when she doffed the weave and the lace-front to show America her “real hair”.  Hah!  Let me tell you about REAL hair.

My hair is a disobedient dog.  It stands there when you tell it to sit, ignoring you even when you push its rump to the floor.  The color is fading and even when I feed and groom it, its not as animated as it used to be.  It goes where it wants, indoors or out, and generally exasperates me to the point that I want to get rid of it.  Then I look at it, scratch it behind the ears and promise to let it go another week.

If you recognize this relationship, you may have natural(ly curly) hair.

For the majority of my life, I wore my hair straight:  a “press and curl”, relaxer, flat iron.  (For my Caucasian friends, my hair is not like yours.   Its generally textured and requires hours of chemical/heat processing and some kind of grease, elbow or otherwise, to get that bouncin’ and behavin’ look you may take for granted.)  This is not a complaint, as I happily performed the requisite styling ritual from age 7 to 35 and was very good at it.  I could shampoo, blowdry and curl my very thick shoulder-length hair in 45 minutes from start to finish.  If you’ve ever had your hands in my hair, you know that’s impressive.  I never knew my natural hair texture since I booked it to the salon religiously for my retouch.  (Another aside for my Caucasian sisters:  having 2 textures of hair  - kinky and straight – is bad for styling and for hair breakage, so we get a “perm” – not the curly kind – every 6-8 weeks)

To continue the canine metaphor, by age 35 my hair had begun to play dead.  It was unresponsive, bored, listless, and overprocessed from relaxing and permanent haircolor – grey get thee behind me!  I sported a ponytail nearly every day, which is

After "The Big Chop"...see how happy I am?

when most people decide to go for a haircut.  On my 35th birthday, I shampooed my beyond shoulder-length bob, and went to work.  At lunchtime I pulled a Britney, and returned with a closely-shorn Afro!  Somewhere inside my head that day was the desire to get rid of things I didn’t need, like the guy I was seeing at the time who couldn’t bother to wish me a happy birthday.  Also, I’d thought about it for a while, and the other women in the office with naturals pulled me over the edge.  It was fantastic: no muss, no fuss, and thick curly ringlets…who knew?

Fast forward to 2009.   I’m unemployed, no longer working in Ethnic Haircare, and I’ve gone 0 for 3 with the hair, which I’ve cut off 3 times since “the big chop”.  I have dreams of a huge Angela Davis ‘fro with a pick sticking out the back, you know the kind with the fist.  I even own one.  But I have no patience, which one needs when attempting to deal with new hair, and I’m off to the barber on wings of frustration.  As we speak, I’m sporting some mean Bantu knots (thanks, Dana!) and fighting the urge for yet another cut.

You may be asking, who the hell cares about your hair when there are so many important things going on?  First, hair is very important to women, especially Black women.  And to White men who are going bald but insist on clinging to scraps.  Anyway, Black hair holds sociopolitical significance, to wit my reference to an Angela Davis Afro which likely conjures images of revolution and protest along with her signature spherical ‘do.  In the ’60s, Black women stopped straightening to make the statement, “Black is beautiful” in all its natural shades and forms.  In the ’80s and ’90s, we sort of gave up on all that and looked to Clair Huxtable’s silky locs as an image of corporate success.  Lately, with the proliferation of styling methods and individual fashion, dreadlocs are becoming mainstream-ish and Black women of all walks of life are walking away from chemical straightening.  A few years ago, an editor at a top fashion magazine was fired for telling a group of female attorneys that Black women had to wear straight hair to be professional.  Now, with a Black woman in the White House, Time magazine and The New York Times are talking about why Michelle’s hair matters.  Not to mention the recent outcry over the inappropriateness of Malia’s twists for an overseas visit.  The only remotely comparable hair hub-bub was Jen Aniston’s signature “Rachel” cut, but nobody thought it was some pro-Greek statement about her heritage; it was just fashion.

The hair was healthy here, after 4 months of braids and a 3-inch haircut. I miss it about once a year.

Admittedly, my decision to go natural was about getting healthy hair and a strong curiosity about what my God-given texture actually was.  And, of course, using permanent haircolor to get rid of the grey – let’s be real!  But now that I’ve done it, I’m not going back.  I’ve worn braids and twists for convenience, but I haven’t worn my hair straight since July 12, 2007.   Even the idea of wearing braids with straight hair feels egregious to me: the point of fake hair is to mimic your real hair, not to fake the funk.  My hair has become my personal statement as much as my personal statement.  But I’m not hating on my relaxed sisters; you do you and I’ll do me.

Into this melee of consciousness comes my need for a new job, and my fear that my hair will somehow be inappropriate.  After all, the MBA machine taught me how to fit in, wear the blue suit and say what I have to say to get the job.  The recession has brought out career coaches as talking heads reminding us that when all applicants are highly qualified, culture and personality matter more than skills; you don’t want to give them a reason not to hire you.  Is my hair that reason?  With the White male across the desk think “Black Power” when he looks at what my hair is doing?  My big earrings are to stop people from calling me “sir” because I have short hair, but will the interviewer take them as counter-culture and hire the woman with neat (read: straight)  hair and small pearls?  Don’t tell me I’m being paranoid until you’ve had random Caucasians pawing at your hair, asking how it got that way, or inquiring if you wash it or some such nonsense.  Part of me wants to interview with the black-fist pick in my hair, wearing a dashiki under my corporate suit.  The other part of me – the one that needs money and healthcare – says “get thee to a hot comb and suck it up”.  I know there’s a happy medium where kinky twists rest comfortably atop a twinset and a knee-length skirt, but its gonna take me a while to get there.

Oh, and for the record Michelle’s hair is natural, and she rocks the flat iron on the regular.  I know her stylist.

Rule #1: Don’t do dumb shit

Where can I get this?

Have people literally gotten stupider and stupider?  In case you’re one of them, I’ve highlighted the important parts of this post.

Today Plaxico Burress, form.erly of the NY Giants, was sentenced to up to 3 1/2 years in prison for shooting himself in the leg.  Okay, it was really for carrying a concealed weapon, and not having a license to carry or operate said weapon in New York.  A lot of people are going to start beefing because its another Black man going to prison for stuff that other people get away with, and they’ll also bring up Michael Vick.  But I think Plaxico should go to prison.  The charge?  Acting like a damn fool.

Where is his mama?  Actually, she’s deceased, and rolling in her grave as we speak because her son is an idiot.  Let’s review the facts of the case.  The man was concealing a Glock, in the waistband of his sweatpants, in a club.  When the gun started to slip (duh!),  he grabbed at it and inadvertently shot himself.  I don’t even know where to begin.

First of all, doesn’t he remember what happened to Puffy in the club with a gun in New York City?  It was a little shady, but there was a weapons charge.  Diddy didn’t go to prison, but that’s because he wasn’t stupid enough to shoot himself.  He also didn’t get fired, since he owns the record company and whatever else he does.  Second of all, who tries to hold a big-ass gun in the waistband of some sweatpants?  You can’t put anything in those because you know it’s going to fall down.  Special stupidity recognition to Plax for putting a loaded weapon that close to his junk, which should have been injured instead of his thigh.  What do you tell his son?  Daddy was a really good football player, and a sports hero for clinching the Super Bowl for the New York Giants in 2008 – look at the championship ring!  But say goodbye to him for a long time, because he’s also a doofis.  No more fans plaguing us for autographs, just TV cameras.  Let’s hope he tries to redeem himself in the book I assume is forthcoming.

Idiocy is not limited to the NFL.  In today’s news, there was a story of a married Long Island minister having an affair with two married sisters he was counseling through divorce.  I got your counsel right here, baby!  Actually, that was the line: the physical relationship was part of the counseling that he provided, helping them to heal.  I don’t recall the Bible passage about sexual healing, but I missed a few Sunday School classes.  And I don’t know whether to be more troubled by the minister’s behavior, or that of the sisters with whom he had simultaneous affairs.  To be sure, a member of the clergy shouldn’t get into anyone’s pants to solve a problem, and he was thrown out of his church when news of the affairs spread through the parish.  However, I’ve learned that when someone attempts something, he believes in its success.  In other words, he’d probably successfully used pastoral counseling as a springboard for affairs in the past.  To his credit, it did work, which brings me to the two sisters.  What kind of person do you have to be to believe that sleeping with your married pastor will bring you anything but grief?  Apparently they were vulnerable from their respective divorce proceedings, and Rev. Happy Pants took advantage. Another thing:  don’t these sisters talk to each other?  Didn’t they have occasion to say, hey Sis, I’m porking our pastor and he’s made me forget about what’s-his-name.  Oh, really?  Me too, and he should change his name to Dr. Feelgood!  He was seeing them at the same time and took them both to the same hotel for goodness’ sake.  Different times, of course, otherwise it would’ve been a different kind of party.  How gullible to you have to be to sleep with your minister, not because you have the hots for him and have been sitting on the first pew without panties for years, but because he’s recommending it as part of your therapy.  That is, quite frankly, one of the stupidest things I’ve ever heard.

My friend’s father started a church.  It began as a joke when Bush offered tax breaks for religious entities, so my friend’s father decided to have a little fun and buy some property in the name of his “church”, which I will call “The Church of Dog” to protect the innocent (its all perfectly legal).  My friend’s dad is an atheist, and against organized religion, but he decided to put some tenets into “The Church of Dog”, stuff he believed in.  So here they are:  #1)Don’t do dumb shit,  #2) Live by the Golden Rule – that’s “do unto others…” in case you don’t remember, and #3) Work ceaselessly to maximize your own potential.

Clearly “The Church of Dog” needs a parish.  I can think of at least 3 new members.