Thursday
Jun072007
Great moments in avoidance: let's talk hair
Thursday, June 7, 2007
"Hair brings one's self-image into focus; it is vanity's proving ground. Hair is terribly personal, a tangle of mysterious prejudices." ~Shana Alexander
I have a little problem. Actually I have several problems starting with my inability to leave DC along with a battery of other things, so let’s discuss something else, because I’m good at digression. Let’s talk about my hair!
Then there is another problem called Permanent Self-Deprecation Syndrome. It’s a chronic and at one point debilitating illness symptoms of which include the complete inability to accept a compliment of any sort. Say, you think my boobs are nice and perky? I do too, but you know they could still use some serious work. Oh, you like my hair? Yeah it’s a giant crap pile on the top of my head. But thanks!
And there you have it I have absolutely no interest in myself and yet here I sit, day in and day out or at least almost twice a week. Maybe. Slaving over a hot laptop typing out my thoughts and feelings for the masses because THEY CARE.
I am narcissist. Hear me roar.
That said, yesterday during my one and probably only engagement at the Advice Smackdown, someone asked about my hair. In fact on occasion the subject of my hair comes up and I laugh it off because ‘cute’ and ‘sassy’ are not the words I would use to describe it. See: Giant crap pile on the top of my head. Paragraph two, line 6.
My hair and I have had a serious hate/hate relationship for the last 18 or so years. In case, you’ve missed it or are color blind I am black, therefore my hair is and can be a massive afro type thing that channels Angela Davis at rather regular intervals. To keep this short, I went through a ‘relaxer’ phase during which my hair was chemically straightened and then continuously fell out. There were the requisite braids done by Senegalese women who yelled at me for falling asleep after 8 hours on my ass and one time one asked whether or not I was pregnant. That ended my adventures in hair braiding and it also caused chunks at my hairline to fall out.
Two and half years ago, I decided to go into the Peace Corps, which was yet another one of those irrational decisions based on hormonal energies and being a teenager who hated life. Obviously life in Uzbekistan would be that much better. Thus, I decided to grow my fucking hair out. Never so much have I had to put emphasis on the use of ‘fucking’ as an adjective because the whole ordeal was a royal pain in the ass. It ended up like a fro and frizzy and just plain stupid looking and the only place I ended up going was Madrid. I'll spare you the painful Spain three months of headband phase, because it was awful and every photo of me in Barcelona makes me want to cry. Totally ruined my whole Dali experience. But I digress:
Exhibit A:
Note the frizz and afro like qualities. I was wearing bell bottoms and a W.E.B Dubois t-shirt under that cashmere sweater.
Then my brother got married and so I straightened it
Exhibit B:
It looked pretty and I spent the entire weekend whipping my head around and my dad kept petting my head. Sadly the only available men at my brother’s wedding were my cousins so I had no use for the cute flippy hair except to keep stroking my head because it was so soft and not frizzy. It also cost my entire months worth of grocery shopping, but my lord, it was so worth it.
Exhibit C:
This was at BlogHer. I decided for the braids because California is hot and sweaty and there would be a pool. And it looked kind of cute. Sort of. Actually every time I see these pictures I want to crawl under a table and pray that no one remembers me and my stupid looking hair that made me look like a 14 year old.
Then I got smart and by ‘smart’ I mean I discovered the best product ever known to (wo)man. A product that I have spent hundreds of dollars on but that is the price I will pay for frizz free curls and ‘cute’ hair. Basically I just don’t want a fuzz ball on top of my head.
Exhibits D, E and F:
The product is called Miss Jessie’s Curly Pudding. A scoop of that stuff after a quick wash and condition and your hair comes out like magic. It’s just so soft and curly and lovely and presentable.
I recently ran out of money during my unemployment period and could not order any more product, which begat these pictures. It was awful and horrible and my mother threatened to beat me if I didn’t do anything with my hair and I couldn’t because I had no money. It was the longest week of my life (I also suffer from Severe Hyperbolic Disorder, if you hadn’t already noticed).
Amy mentioned this the other day, but sometimes you just HAVE to spend the money. Even if it’s deemed ridiculous by others, there are just some things I’m not willing and look positively awful by being frugal on. Read: My breast/knee – cap relationship and the fuzzball that Alfre Woodard had to endure.
Now I have lovely hair that I actually sometimes have a mediocre relationship with and Kris likes to sniff my head because apparently it smells like berries. So everyone’s a winner.
20 comments | permalink posted in: Great moments in narcissism, Humdrum
Great moments in narcissism, Humdrum
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Reader Comments (20)
I'm sorry, but it's true: I do love your hair. Take my compliment! Take it, dammit!
HOLY CRAP YOU LOOK SO HOT. LIKE CRAZY EFFING HOT. HI.
I have been pressing my hair for the last nine months or so. Oops. Correction. I have been paying to have it straightened. This was after the requisite braids. I pay plenty of money these days because I have a standing appointment at least every two weeks. I have thought about trying a more "natural" look but couldn't figure out what products to use. Thank you for your recommendation. Because your hair? It looks great.
I know that this is so not the point, but you look AMAZING in that last picture. (And the one before, and the one before that...)
You look very pretty with straight hair, but I like the curly look you're sporting now. You look HAWT! You look lovely with the other styles, but those two are my favorites (not that you asked).
After years of straightening my hair, I cut my waist length hair and went natural in college because I had no money. I wear it very short and curly now.
I like the au naturelle style that you get spending your $100 on Ms. Jessie's products. Braiding it just sounds like a pain in the ass. 8hours?! PHuck that! I'd rather shave it all off.
I really like the pictures of you at the bottom with the flirty cut and curl! Better than the one with it straightened. But you are right, sometimes you have to spend money on certain things, or crawl into a hole and start stalking squirrels instead.
Seriously, when my hair started doing that it was a huge sigh of relief. It had been falling out and shit from all the abuse and now it's perfectly fine. It's still a pain because I have A LOT of hair. And dude the $100 worth of product is just oh so very helpful, it sucks, but look at my hair!
I have relaxed hair (I'm not as brave as you) but I still have a good curl pattern to my hair. Youre about the third person to mention Curly Pudding in the last few days. I need a summer humidity hair style and Jessie's might just be it!
And, Erinn, it lasts for a good while as well.
Thank for the post! I've always wanted to wear my hair natural, but my hair is too thick to be able to manage (I tried when I was pregnant and eventually just said fuck it and got a perm). My sister has short, natural hair though, so I'm going to buy this for her and see how she likes it.
I defintely agree that you can't be too cheap when it comes to hair products. Cheap Black hair care products for the most part suck because they are pretty much the same thing in different packaging.
Have you ever tried www.carolsdaughter.com/" rel="nofollow">Carol's Daughter's products? That's mainly what I use and I think they are pretty good. My hair has definitely grown a lot since I started using them.
Ok. I'm done rambling.
I have heard amazing things about Carol's Daughter, but never tried it because I found the Miss Jessie's first.
Damn, your hair looks really awesome in the Exhibits D, E, and F pics. You look so cute!
My hair has been doing some suspect things lately and am this close to hacking it off. I can't go natural I don't have time to care for it, but I am so going to slather the pudding on my daughters hair! Thanks!
Honestly that's what I thought as well - which also reminds me that I forgot to post pictures of the Spain days when it was in a headband every fucking day, because I didn't know what else to do with it - but it turns out that it's so freaking easy. And my hair has grown well past my shoulders (I used a flatiron the other day). It's the first part that sucks at first, with the waiting and everything but you can always do, and what I did, was cut most of the relaxer out and still use natural hair products or a flatiron and then it will grow pretty quickly then cut the rest of the relaxer out and voila! Now, I literally wet it, put in a gob of curly pudding, twist it into about 6-8 twists and sleep on it. Wake up in the morning take the twists out and it looks like that. The end.
If nice hair makes one a narcissist, then sista hear me roar too ;-)
After having boy-short hair for 7 years, I decided to grow it out and see what my hair was actually like. I decided that I would give it to some cancer-ridden kid via Locks of Love. Now that my hair is well past my shoulders, reality has set in: donating my hair to locks of love would simply be dooming some poor kid to have insane Medusa-style hair. I didn't even know that I had curly hair! Of course, the culminating event in all of this was my dad on graduation day. I came downstairs, fully ready to go out for breakfast and announce my engagement when he says 'Aren't you going to brush your hair?' What the fuck? My hair was actually all smoothly wavy and shiny and looking pretty darn good. So my response to my dad 'That isn't an appropriate thing to say' as though he was a 3rd grader.
Argh. Stupid cancer-ridden kids and media influence (I am so weak) and genes and crap like that.
Strangely enough, my father literally just said to me: "And you need to do your hair, it looks like shit". My hair, looks exactly like exhibits D-F. My response was to hang up on him. Because I am the 3rd grader.
Followed the link from Amalah's blog- great piece on bronzers. Your hair looks great. I am really thinking about the pudding. I hear they have travel sizes, so the investment is not that much for the newbie.
Yes! Travel sizes! You can get the missjessies.com/products.htm" rel="nofollow">full set of products in little 2oz TSA friendly jars. Which means being able to fly the friendly skies without fear of losing your precious and expensive product and also without having to use a spoon to force some curly pudding into a tiny bottle or something. It's Awesome. And I forgot, I also use the curly buttercreme for those in between days when I'm feeling really lazy. Or after a night of hard drinking. But use that shit sparingly. Seriously.
Ooh, fabulously lovely hair with the product! And I agree -- no matter how poor I am, I feel like hair stuff is worth it (you wear it every day, you know?)
Dude! Exactly! And come on, I mean you saw the 'before' shots. I just want lovely hair that doesn't require work and if that requires spending $150 on hair product, then so be it.
And for anyone that is wondering, my shampoo and conditioner? L'Oreal. Which I got on the queserasera.org/archives/001059.html" rel="nofollow">recommendation of Sarah Brown because I needed something for curly, dry, frizzy crap and nothing too expensive since most of what you use in the shower goes down the drain anyway. It's what is put in after that counts.
I thought I'd check out these hot photos one more time...
I bet that's you refreshing my Flickr page. Would you like for me to use one of these photos on Twitter as well? Would you be able to handle such a thing?