HAIR
. This is hair, a thing that is so mundane
yet so powerful.
Isn’t it ironic that a thing such as hair
defines a lot of facets the likes of beauty, modesty, professionalism status
quo? An oddity of protein presented in the form of a strand-like mass cumulated
in its upmost on the head of an individual. This is hair, a thing that is so
mundane yet so powerful.
There have been many things that have
compelled me to write this. It might perhaps be the time when Mama Ene called
my braid-out unkempt or when a child of six sat on a saloon chair and smiled
with glee at her newly relaxed hair. Or it could be the time when a security
guard at my Uni seized my ID card because he felt my hair was wrong. Ugly
because it wasn’t lying flat or packed tight submissively but wildly beautiful,
he didn’t know that kind of beauty. The elation I felt from telling him my hair
was being as it was made and no authority could tell it to be otherwise must
have been the adrenaline that surged me to my computer to write this, it was.
I recently looked through the flaps of
photo albums stacked in storage and realized I never had a childhood photograph
(younger me didn’t exactly like the camera much) where my hair was its real
self. From the loose curls of baby hair, straight to the thin flats of flat-ironed
or relaxed hair. My mother was most likely thinking of the easiest way to
manage my hair when she made such an early conversion to heat and chemicals.
The child me was though most pleased to own straight hair like the
olive-skinned people she was accustomed to on Disney and Nickelodeon, and when
she didn’t wear it in cornrows she would let it down and twirl it around. She
loved her chemically manipulated straight hair, the child me.
When my childhood grew into the curious air
of a teenager, I still liked my hair straightened with a constant indulgence of
flat irons and hot combs. I had been so ingrained into the societal brainwash
that defined beauty by straight hair that I couldn’t see beauty without
straight or permed hair.
In my significant life journey, after hair
burns from chemicals and excessive breakage from trying to make my hair what it
was not and had refused to be, I experienced a restlessness disguised as
stillness. I stared my reflection in the mirror and realized the struggle, the
strangeness that stared right back at me and I picked up a scissors and chopped
it away.
At first I marvelled at the bean-shaped
size of my head bare of hair, running my hands over it, I laughed with
happiness. It was the frightening yet hopeful kind of growth, the type that
holds your breath and empties your chest of the stranger that was once there. I
watched my hair grow into the months, realised how beautifully springy it was,
how sensually soft it felt pampered with moisture and how wildly it spun off
wilfully in all directions.
Perhaps this was when I truly fell in love
with it, when I realised that much like me, my hair had its own will and
wouldn’t be tamed. It was wild, rebellious and the trouble of my life and I
loved it! It didn’t want to be anything but itself, it wanted to be left alone
to be by anyone who didn’t love it as itself, including me, and there is
nothing more beautiful than this.
So, dear future partner if you’ve been
fantasizing running your hands through silky hair, I believe now’s the time to
pray fate changes your course from my direction.
Lol I joke, I unfortunately possess no belief
in fate.
A hi nya, with
love, x E
Photography
|| Ene Ijato
Styling
|| Ene Ijato
Makeup || Ene Ijato
Makeup || Ene Ijato
2 comments
This article reminds me of how myopic people are in there way of reasoning. A lady once said it's only those that doesn't have money to take good care of their hair that usually keeps it natural.
ReplyDeleteI was like girl, you need to do some unlearning and relearning.
The society has redefined the meaning of neat hair to some individuals which is wrong.
Natural hair are the most expensive hair to take care of.
Organic producths are not cheap like the relaxer they use.
And natural hairs are unique in a special way that some individuals don't see.
Keeping hair is something I love but then, my parents comes into play with the mind set that I look rough and irresponsible when I do so.
In all, I would say something I learnt from Chimamanda Ngozi Adiche which is, we should all redefine the meaning of neat.
This is actually in conformity with my reasonings to my mom. I'm a young black man with a paled hair, i like to think i'm a blonde blackman. She tells me to cut it down or dye it black but i always tell her that i have nothing to be ashamed of cos it's my God given,natural hair and i love it. People now dye their hairs brown you know.
ReplyDeleteEager to hear your thoughts!