Dopes and dopettes,
I have a
small, small confession to make.
I am KICK-ASS!No, I'm not KICK-ASS, although that would be fuckin' awesome. You should all probably see that movie and look out for a costumed crusader coming to a town near you!
Now, onto the topic at hand. My hair.
I got a hair cut recently and as any black man can tell you, there is no better feeling than having your ears freshly lowered. And as any black man can also attest to, theres no worse feeling than not having the aforementioned haircut. Now, I am somewhere in between the two...my haircut isn't fresh but I don't quite need a new one...I am in the "hair upkeep" stage which is why I wrote this blog in the first place.
I was thinking
"Ricky (that's what I call myself when I talk to myself), are you keeping your hair natural, ARE YOU keeping it real?" And the answer is no, at least I don't think so. Rather I don't even know what natural actually is. Follow me as I venture into memories of hairs long gone...
**DISCLAIMER** I apologize for the ignorance I have in "natural" hair. If I offend you in this blog, well, oh well...Elementary School Hair Care
Ahhhh, the good ol' days when I didn't give a damn about how I looked or smelled for that matter. I was your regular little black boy. A lil ashy around the knees and elbows and some nappy ass hair. I don't know if it was my grandmothers ignorance about male hair care products or the fact that she too didn't give a damn if my scalp was dry because all I remember is getting my hair combed, a lot...and it hurt...I hated it. I never had braids or anything like that and I got haircuts but in that mean time, in between time, the comb and I had a Ike and Tina type relationship and the comb was whoopin' my ass. Occasionally, when my grandma felt, she would through a lil' Pink Lotion into my deprived scalp but it seemed that the KKK was the only way to kill the nigger naps in my hair.
Middle School - High School Hair Care
Now, I don't know when, but at some point I became fascinated with waves. Like facial hair, I thought this would be the "thing" to separate me from the children. Waves meant I was a MAN, well at least a teenager. So, I asked my friends who in turn gave me horrible advice about how to get waves. So, I got a low hair cut, some DAX wave grease, a du-rag and a wave brush. I applied the thick wave grease to my hair evenly and began to brush my hair like Marsha from the Brady Brunch was my idol. Then I wore my du-rag......all the time......everywhere. It's almost like the waves I were cultivating were my best kept secret.
Now I know you were probably wondering as I was rambling on "Did it work?" and the answer is, kind of. I got waves...on the top and around the sides but I must admit, it was very incomplete, like Mary J Blije when she's happy. And now my hair had a thick, greasy feel. I used so much damn grease my du-rag had waves. Whenever I ran out of grease, I knew I had a weeks worth stored up in my du-rag. Needless to say, this was not the way.
I tinkered with other ways before I found the one. And the answer was right in my shower the whole time. It was in the bottle of conditioner I was using that I previously had no idea what it was made for. I was told to leave the conditioner in my hair, then brush it and put the du-rag on. This transformed my life immensely. For the first time in my life, I had let my Soul Glo. And the waves were a spinnin. And my hair was healthy and not DAXed the fuck up.
Senior Year High School Hair Care and Beyond
Problem solved right, no. Having waves took way too much fucking work. The summer going into my senior year, I was working a summer job and volunteering. And like most of my ex-girlfriends that I stopped paying attention to, they slipped. My waves quickly became mere ripples in a pond made by a 3 year old girl with a pebble. But the fight was not lost because now I had became aware of something else...my hair had natural waves..when kept up. This keep up part was the hard part. The conditioner theory worked but added another 20 minutes to a shower and then I remembered back to the early days of hair care and I thought, HAIR LOTION! But not Pink Lotion, that was old lady hair lotion, no, I needed something else and I was introduced to Hollywood Beauty Olive Oil Hair Lotion. My Lord, this stuff changed my life. It made scalp moist (funny word, moist) and made my hair shine like the suits Puffy used to wear. And from then on, this was it...this was what I was going to do. I got the process down to 5 minutes and BAM!
"So Ricky, thanks for that interesting look into your slightly girl-like love affair with your hair but what does that have to do with your hair being natural? Are YOU keeping it real?" I'm happy I asked myself that. The answer is I don't know. When I got to college, I saw a lot of girls becoming obsessed with this natural look. I was confused at first and I believe I am still confused now as to what "going natural" really means. I met a girl with extensions in her hair (bamboo earings...you know the rest) who claimed she was "natural" to which I replied "tell that to the bald horse walking around now". As far as I know now, being natural just means not getting a perm, rather not using chemicals in your hair. It's healthier and it seems to give girls an amazing feeling...when done right. When done wrong, that same Sistah Girl singin India Arie will be dancing around to Just For Me on the way to the Dominicans.
And that brings us here ladies and gents, is my hair natural. Am I selling out my beautiful black roots by trying to make my hair what it isn't. Should I just like my hair grow out into the peasy mess that the man in the sky intended? If it were the 70's, would niggas with waves be the niggas with the fliest jheri curls? Or should I get my Detroit Red conk on?
I don't know, conks sound like they hurt.
