Girls with Glasses talk HAIR

Well, hello again already chicas! It’s me once more. It’s my goal to make 2-3 updates today. Hope it’s cool. This one will be short but sweet, or at least that is the goal. So, my hair… yeah… It continues to flourish and grow. I still love it, but I haven’t been experimenting or consumed with it lately. We are settled, like a seasoned and boring couple for whom movie night is now an exciting date. LOL! I attended a party recently and the pictures were posted on FB and I marveled at how BIG my hair was on a day when I thought it looked terrible. Check out the pic of me and a lovely curly some of you may recognize from CurlyNikki.com! I am trying out a new product which I will review in a few days. I was trying to wait a week or two before I talk about it. It’s been discussed before on other threads with good reviews and I found it in my city. Stay tuned, I’ll come back to this in a few days!
I lurk a lot of threads on hair and I hear a lot of women say “It’s just hair!”. They are screaming it from the mountain tops, I swear! I’m about to go against the grain on that talk. Yeah, it is just hair but it’s not JUST HAIR. At least not for me. I care about every single part of me, hair included and on some days… especially. Every time I hear someone say that I wonder why only women say it, refer to it as an accessory. I wonder why they never say- ‘it’s just clothes… shoes… jewelry. Things that are actually-- detachable. That would make more sense to me. I mean, you can give those items away. Someone else can often fit them and they often come in one size fits all. I don’t see my hair as THAT way. My hair is no more a simple accessory than are my legs or my arms which are often taken for granted (sorry limbs!). As if they owe us something. As if it is somehow promised they will work tomorrow. I know I have been trying to make amends with my entire body lately. I’ve been exercising, trying to get my limbs back in shape. And since I started my natural journey, I have been doing the same with my hair. I used to take it for granted too. Relax, color, relax, color, cut it off when I didn’t like it anymore, relax, color, relax, color and then chop it all off again. Basically, mistreat it. Called it… IT. But no more. My hair… SHE actually has a name- Thelma. Because she’s a throw back to Good Times (though not for my momma) when my hair was free to be itself and in essence so was I. Thelma is my way of rebelling against a time of learned, self abuse. Thelma is a boycott of the days when the chemical mistreatment of my hair was more costly, important and routine to me than eating a simple, daily breakfast. Well times have changed my friends. I realized it the other day in a cozy, urban coffee shop where my hair and I are normal. Other beautiful curly and naturals chicks hang out there on a regular basis. While rushing to grab a table, I bumped into a non-black woman (who was curly herself) with my over-sized purse. I thought she would be annoyed but instead she turned and expressed that she loved my hair before asking me if I’d seen Good Hair. Of course I had and it was a great compliment. Bottom line though: You accept you. They accept you. It’s that simple.
At the end of the day, my hair is my crown. A jewel. The star on my tree. The number one statement of… me. It is what people see when they look at me. It’s how my husband and son find me when we become separated in a store crowded with relaxers and weaves. It is a part of my i.d. And that’s just fine with me.
So much for short and sweet, huh? ;)