Tag: WOC

Soft, Wild, Ever-Changing & Rooted

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  • My relationship with my hair (yes, it’s a full-blown relationship) is the most tumultuous, forgiving, difficult, loving, shady relationship I’ve ever had. Some days it respects me, other days I wear a headband and pray for the best. Some days I worry so much about the decision I’ve made, other days we coexist beautifully.
  • Many see my natural hair as a political statement, but most days it’s simply a deeply personal decision that also happens to be displayed for the world to see.
  • I’ve found that support and encouragement will come in big and small ways, often unexpected but always appreciated.
  • I’ve found that criticism and judgment will come in big and small ways, often accompanied by someone tryna put their grubby hands in your hair without asking (*major side-eye*).
  • I try to take both compliments & criticism with a grain of salt. Mostly, I try to remember that someone’s feelings about my hair is often more of a reflection that person than my actual hair.
  • I have grown to love my coils. This was an unexpected event. To get here I had to work through a lot of internalized bullshit and misconceptions about natural hair. Before I went natural, I assumed there were only two types of natural textures; one being more socially accepted and beautiful than the other. But I was so, so wrong. There are millions of iterations of natural hair, as many as there are women of color on this Earth. I could never have known what texture my coils would be like until I took this leap.
  • My bathroom looks like I robbed a hair salon.
  • Cutting my hair off was an act of courage I never thought I had in me. But I am so grateful I did. There’s something about my hair that feels like who I want to be: soft, wild, ever-changing, and rooted.

 

“You have to kind of really have conviction with it because there is so many pressures to straighten your hair all the time. But the result is a beautiful thing, you know? And it’s funny because I always think it’s interesting that to keep my hair the same texture as it grows out of my head is looked at as revolutionary. Like, why is that?” – Tracey Thoms, Good Hair (2009)

milk and honey

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The two poems below are written by Rupi Kaur. She’s this incredible poet, writer, and bad ass woman of color. You might have heard of her a while back when her menstruation-themed photo series was taken down by Instagram for being “offensive”. I was in a book store (as usual) and my eyes ran across her book, milk & honey. I had no idea who the author was, nor made the connection with the Instagram story. But something about the book whispered. So I got it. Inside, I’ve found beautiful poetry of love, loss, and healing. The ones below articulate a couple things I’ve been unable to up until this point. Mostly, it’s this aching to move forward while knowing how much I would leave behind. Destructive cycles and putting the past on a pedestal don’t work. They never have. Letting go and moving forward is the only way I know how to mend and survive this…

neither of us is happy
yet neither of us wants to leave
so we keep breaking one another and calling it love
 
– untitled // Rupi Kaur
 
you were the most beautiful thing i’d ever felt till now. and i was convinced you’d remain the most beautiful thing i’d ever feel. do you now how limiting that is. to think at such a ripe young age i’d experienced the most exhilarating person i’d ever meet. how i’d spend the rest of my life just settling. to think i’d tasted the rawest form of honey and everything else would be refined and synthetic. that nothing beyond this point would add up. that all the years beyond me could not combine themselves to be sweeter than you.
 
– falsehood // Rupi Kaur