Curly Hair

I have had curly for exactly 38 years, 4 days and give or take a few hours.  I have not always enjoyed the curls.  In fact if you can believe it I went through a “I want straight-hair” phase.  Shocking I know.  I even went through a perm phase or as my grandpa and the cowardly lion from the Wizard of Oz called them a “permanent.”   I know you are asking yourself, “why would someone with naturally curly hair get a perm?”   That is a great question and I will have to refer you to my mother on that one.  Oh and if you do ask her about that can you ask her what she was thinking with those God awful beige corduroy knickers she made me wear in the 3rd grade.  I am still not over that!

So back to my hair.  Yes I was like most young girls who saw everything great about other girls and wanted to take the best of their qualities and make the perfect version of ourselves.  Which is funny because all those pieces didn’t include any of who we really were.  I remember the first time I had straight hair.  It was a dream come true.  My friend was getting married and I was lucky enough to be in the wedding party.  First bridesmaid gig and boy was it a treat to actually go get my hair did!  So I marched into the beauty shop of lovely Fontana and tell the hair dresser make me beautiful!  So she asks, “would you like your hair straightened?”  I was shocked and thought, “there is no way she can make this head of hair straight.”  I had no idea that black women had been paying these hair dressers to make their hair straight for years.  Remember I grew up in Fontana obviously I didn’t make it into the  beauty salon very often.  Any who after a shampoo, a blow-dry and a serious hot iron session I had straight hair like those girls on TV.   Wow I looked at myself in the mirror and had no idea who was staring back.  So it began my quest to recreate this amazing moment of my hair’s history.  Of course I was never able to perfect it so I kept the curly hair.

Then it happened!  Julia Roberts portrays a crazy red-headed prostitute in Pretty Woman.  Well this changed everything.  People were all into the curls.  Now should I even go into the fact that we are a society trying to emulate a  prostitute.  The answer is No, not in this blog.  Ok so now my hair had clout and street cred!  I had hair like Vivian Ward and that’s fine by me (minus the fact I was not a prostitute).   So time continues and technology develops and brings the beauty salon straighten irons into the homes of regular folk like myself.   I was obsessed.  Planning days in advance as to when and how I was going to wash my hair, blow dry and then spend the next laborious hours of straightening my hair.  It wasn’t until I was actually burning my hands, arms and scalp with the hot iron did I start to question what I was doing.  I was finally able to look like all the other ‘pretty’ girls.  But didn’t they just make a movie about a Pretty Woman who didn’t have curly hair?? I was confused.  Who was I?  Do I have straight hair or curly hair?  Well the answer is easy and since you are on my blog you know the answer.  I am a curly girl.  I am a girl who is happy to look in the mirror and see her hair all over the place because that is exactly how I am.  All over the place.  I love that my hair get frizzy when the weather is humid because that is exactly how I feel when it’s humid.  I have finally accepted and actually love this part of who I am.  It feels so amazing to be accepting of me.   You know what else I learned?? That the only opinion that matters is yours anyways since you are the one who is with you the whole time so be who you are.

I will end my first post with a realization I had tonight…I am really good at being me!