A big issue in my mind the past couple of months has been what I’m going to do with my [tag]hair[/tag]. One thought is to cut it off. Off, like hers. I’m not much into ‘fros, but I could wear it that kind of short.
Another thought is locks. It’s not one I’m terribly partial to, since it seems like a decent amount of work. Plus, I’d have to cut my hair off twice if I decided I didn’t like ’em.
The third idea is to just quietly go natural and change the style of my hair. This break, I took a break not only from schoolwork and email, but from my usual severe hairstyle.
Not extremely different than the look of old, but much more comfortable and loose. Fewer ponytail holders and rubber bands. I could wear that with natural (unpermed) hair.
This brings up so many issues, though. I mean, we’ve seen very recently that black women are still very much judged by their hair. If it’s not something that is “conventional”, like a nice, neat ponytail, or tidy plaits/braids, people will balk and label you “wild”, “ghetto”, “unkempt”, “disrespectful”, or just “tacky”.
It seems like it takes much less “mess” for a black person’s hair to be labeled “messy” than that of any other race.
I don’t subscribe to that. I don’t want to support that with my own actions.
I don’t know that I’ll initially find my hair very manageable when it’s natural. I’ll find out as it grows in unpermed. But I think I’ll go ahead and fight with it. It is, after all, the hair I was born with, and it’s nothing to be ashamed of.
Nothing I should have to tie down and chemically process to make acceptable.
That sounds obvious (and it is), but it’s about time I acted on that.
The question remains, though: should I cut off all my hair and keep it short? I don’t know. I have trouble imagining what my face would look like with short hair.
(BTW, I’m not worried about having a mix of permed/natural hair–regular trims will work that off, and I like having longer hair.)
[tags]natural hair, black hair, cynthia mckinney[/tags]
