I spent a very large portion of my time looking inward; really trying to analyze who I was at that time, who I wanted to be, and everything else in between that really didn't have anything to do with me but did all at once.
I'm trying to vaguely put into words what person I was when I was posting back then. My words would be clumped together to paint the person as: a naive, energetic, small town, little girl, that feverishly had very high aspirations, but her head not in the right place or where it belongs.
I feel as though I had my, socially speaking, head where it needed to be: Working a part time job, going to college full time, a very decent idea of what I wanted to do, goals, and all together had my shit where it needed to be.
However, I find that, mentally, I didn't even align where I needed to be. I didn't think further than anything outside of the classroom, getting my paycheck from work, having a boyfriend, and somehow randomly ending up in the fashion industry. Outside of those topics, I honestly couldn't be bothered....and television, yea, I couldn't be bothered outside of that too.
But, as I started to look around, as I started to listen, as I found myself questioning certain things. My mental started to twitch and expand, and honestly, it all came to a head when I started attending school in NYC, and eventually moved here to dorm and go to school.
But if I really want to be honest I started to feel my mind questioning years beyond this point. I guess it began when I was little, and my mother religiously put Relaxers in my hair. My mother had the habit of putting relaxers in my hair, and most notably she did this at home without any professional understanding of what she was doing. Relaxers, for those who don't know, are toxic highly chemical substances that very often African American women put in their hair to give it the eurocentric appearance of Caucasian women's hair or pin straight hair follicles.
This was the point right there, every single time I sat between her legs and she smeared that cold thick substance in between each part of my hair she made, that I thought: Why do I get this done? Why does she do this to my hair? What's so bad about the stuff that grows out?
I'm not really sure what black women enjoys feeling that frigid feeling of relaxer smeared on their head, but I know that my entire life I didn't like it. But, as I got older I just continued to do it out of habit. I continued to do it even though I had my sides burnt out of my head leaving me with bald spots on the side of my head. I continued to do this even though I spent so much money going to the salons once I had more control over my head. I continued to do this even though when I combed my hair, it shed and fell out like your pet's hair does when you are combing them and you haven't in weeks. I kept on relaxing my hair, kept on questioning why, but never did anything about it.
I had what society would deem "good hair". It was long, straight without any kinks, moved, was long past my shoulders and down my back, and moved when the wind blew. Yea, my hair was "perfect" to the other black women in the salons also allowing the hair dressers to pour chemicals on their head, perfect to the majority white people in my Long Island town, and perfect to my mother who spent hours relaxing my hair when was little.
Perfect.
Utterly Perfect.
So perfect.
So fucking perfect that I didn't really sit to think outside of myself for five seconds to realize WHY I was doing it, WHO I was doing it for, and WHAT it represented.
Fast forward to me sitting on Tumblr, fast forwad to me seeing people talking about internalized racism, fast forward to me googling internalized racism, fast forward to me then for hours, days, weeks, months, devouring these words and their meaning and their actions and their vibrations on repeat: internalized racism, eurocentrism, beauty standards, media and norms of beauty, patriarchy, feminism, melanin, natural hair, systematic oppression, cultural appropriation, police brutality, approval, bleaching, self hatred, approval, and plenty more that go beyond words or phrases and jump deeply into structures.
Plain and to the point; the reason I sat through 23 years of relaxing was because I hated myself. Yes, I Razz hated myself, who I was, the person I was, and everything I was all the way up to this point. I literally didn't let myself organically be who I was, think deeper about who I was, or even let my hair be who it was. Let me pause to say, I acknowledge that some women who relax their hair do it cause they enjoy it, but this is my story and my narrative so yea. But, yes, I had all the signs of confidence, with expressing myself through fashion, taking pride in who I was and what I was doing, but deep down, I didn't love myself.
But who could I blame?
Society.
The media.
The list can go on for months if I let it. But what can I say? We are surrounded, force fed, visually bombarded, and chatted up and down about what is "pleasing, desired, envied, better, the best, and accepted" all without taking a moment to look deep and say why? Why is it better for black women to chemically drench their hair in hazardous products that have adverse effects on their internal body for straight hair? Why is it better for the girl in front of the tv to stop eating cause the girl selling the latest watch is skinny and "hot"? Why is it better that women should not enjoy sex while men are expected to be over aggressive or overtly hungry sexually? Why is it the best for the little boy to stop crying when his feelings get hurt and stop acting like a "girl"?
Why? Why? Who says? Who says?
We as humans are much too quick to accept what the media or ingrained ideas say is best or trending, and put how we organically feel or know to be best for our souls second. We put the ideas of other people before our own. We let our friends, family, and peers guilt us out of what we love and into bullshit we can't stomach. For what? A little taste of being accepted that dwindles off once you're alone again and looking up at your ceiling at night?
It's like, we are trained to work against ourselves and being organic to who we are and what are potential is.
We take "you can't do that, you can't wear this, you can't act like this, and you won't ever be able" a lot easier than "you can, you will, you are".
Three weeks with all of this in my head, and alone in my dorm room made me feel conflicted. I felt very chained in a sense, not really free of the soul, mind, and heart.
And I know damn well I am not the only one who feels this.
So...I just did the next rational thing.
I bought a buzzer, sat in my chair for a few hours, and cut and buzzed every inch of hair off of my head.
It was like an itch I needed to scratch, I needed to do this. I felt that if I didn't cut my hair off I would regret something inside of myself for the rest of my life. I felt that if I didn't do this one thing genuinely for myself, and by myself I would hate the living shit out of myself and never be able to stomach myself ever again.
I thought taking this socially beautiful hair and taking the first cut would scare me and make me stop...but when I cut it first my blood was rushing. My heart was going crazy. I was so happy, I started smiling. Then I took my hair, which I tried transitioning to natural, put it all in a pony tail, and snipped it off.
This euphoria was climbing all over me, pride, this inching closer to this part of me I denied for so long. Like I was about to meet someone so foreign to me I only heard stories about. And then I started buzzing and trimming. I literally couldn't stop or take a break till every chemically damaged strand was cut from my head.
My room was throbbing with songs of empowerment, of womanhood, or pushing past society and into something sweeter and true to the self. Beyonce, Lorde, Willow Smith, Ida Marina, and so many more were painting my theme song, and cheering me on as I chopped, and buzzed, and snipped.
Then, after it was done, I couldn't stop staring at myself in the mirror. Who the hell is this crazy, bold, bald chick staring at me? This woman who bought an expensive buzz cutter and took her long locks and chopped them off in a second's notice?
Me.
I was finally looking at myself.
The girl, no the woman, I was looking at was me. And I felt so alien in that moment. I was really, truly, honestly looking at who I was. No chemical hair, no pin straight strands, naked, me.
I admit, I had this small fragment of worry in my stomach...was what I did so fucking wrong? Would this screw me over in the long run going for jobs once I graduate? Would anyone in the fashion world even accept me? Would they just gloss me over once they saw my bold bald naked head, not even looking deeper at what I could do or what my skills were.
I FaceTimed my mother.
Wrong move.
Now, I don't blame my mother, I still love her, but she was taught the same thing. Eurocentric features get you more in life and are better. She first thought I was joking, but as soon as I moved a bit away from the phone to show my bald head, she was furious and my step father wasn't amused either.
"Why would you do that? No one will date you. No one will hire you. Good luck fighting that fight."
Who would have thought that hair influenced jobs, boyfriends, and stood as something so black powered and political?
After that, I just stood and cried. My high of discovery got the blow I was afraid of.
Who could love me without my long relaxed hair? What fashion industry job or magazine would hire me? Would people just think negative?
I felt low, really low. I just fucked up my life at the age of 23 with the buzz of a life time. So, I just did what I thought would help. Sulk in bed for hours.
Then I just went on Pinterest, I searched for bald headed women...and Lupita Nyong'o came up.
Lupita is so beautiful. She's so feminine. Lupita is the essence of beauty. And there she was, on my phone screen with her close cut hair and glowing with a killer smile that could bring any naysayer to the ground in seconds.
Then Solange came up. Looking fierce and unapologetic, makeup bold and eyelashes longer than the heels on my booties. Solange is an untamed spirit, dancing to her own drum, and grooving all the way into the sunset.
Then a whole array of beautiful black women flooded in, each more beautiful than the next with close cut hair, bald, or flat tops. All of them normal women, not celebrities, all unnamed, but so fucking gorgeous.
Looking at Lupita and Solange and those unnamed close cut babes lit something in me. Look at them with their lack of hair, look at their beauty, and where is mine?
Right there where it was the first time I looked into the mirror once I buzzed off all my hair.
My beauty was always there, even when I had that awful damaged hair weighing me down. But cutting it all off, it shined brighter than any diamond, it radiated warmer than the sun, and it glimmered better than the sun catching in a glass and flickering the rainbow.
I was beautiful.
I am beautiful.
Without hair.
Without relaxed hair.
Black, Beautiful, and Shining.
I admit, the next day after ditching my hair, I was scared of what my boss at work would do. I've heard, and seen through the internet, countless black women being fired and let go from jobs because of the hair that naturally grew from their heads. And here I was, going in with no hair at all.
But, no matter what, I decided. I beat my face with makeup, wore bold gold and hot pink skull earrings that dangled, sharp cat eyed liner, dressed sharp in a black blazer and striking accessories. Head held high, walking down the streets of NYC like I'm on the runway, and like I have 100 men following behind me begging for my time.
My boss wasn't fazed, thankfully, and she complimented me and told me she loved the look before tossing me onto the floor with work to do.
So? What did I learn?
Being true to yourself is not a crime and your life isn't over. Releasing the social struggle inside of you out, and following your heart instead of what society says or what the tv says isn't wrong or out of the question, and making the change that sets you free is not a death sentence or will destroy your life. If anything, chopping off my hair was the most orgasmic, freeing, natural high I have ever experienced so far in life. The thrill, the release, the freedom, the dropping off of baggage, and discovering the goddess that was buried under all the chemical mess. Hell, even my mother came around, and still tells me to buzz off my hair even though I'm trying to grow my natural curly tresses out.
Yet, I still find myself questioning whether I can enter the fashion world. Whether my natural hair, yes I now have some curly hair on my head, will allow me into the industry I have dreamed, lived, ate, drank, and craved for for years since the beginning of high school. The industry where society's notion's of beauty are doubled and felt greater.
But, my fear doesn't stop me.
It doesn't stop my goals for becoming a fashion journalist, being a fashion editor, for working at a fashion magazine, and climbing the fashion world's latter. Besides, the fashion world, in my opinion, is getting the call. Fashion is thirsty for different faces, different women with different body shapes and features, and for women who are so bold and fierce in their love for themselves and who they are. Fashion is opening it's arms to models with full, thick, beautiful curvy bodies that look like modern day Venus personified. Even the ads are showing the real of humanity and how gender itself isn't defined by the clothing anymore, as seen in the recent Louis Vuitton campaign with Jaden Smith. The workers in the fashion industry are coming in different shades, sizes, background, and with different curl patterns all over.
Representation matters, and it is here.
Move over society's bullshit standards, cause the world is changing. Women are loving themselves all over. We aren't holding back anymore, and we aren't staying quiet. We are changing everything, and the fashion industry is changing with us.
I used to think back that I was the only black girl aiming for dreams in fashion writing, but I was wrong. Fashion has opened itself, and black women are in there making a difference, and representing proudly. With their curls, their shades, and their beauty shining like diamonds:
Nikki Ogunnaike, Elle.com Senior Fashion Editor
Rajni Lucienne Jacques, Creative Director & Fashion Content Editor
Sarr Jamois, Senior Fashion Editor of i-D Magazine
Tamu McPherson, Founder of All The Pretty Birds
Ericka Goodman-Hughey, Ebony Magazine Fashion Editor
Julee Wilson, Senior Fashion Editor at The Huffington Post
and so many more!
And for celebrities? You don't need me to tell you how diverse Hollywood is getting, with so many beautiful new faces, of different backgrounds, and breaking through. But my favorites are these women crafted out of superb Black Girl Magic:
Amandla Stenberg
Erykah Badu
Lupita Nyong'o
Solange Knowles
Willow Smith
Zoe Kravitz
Look at these babes. Look at how both the fashion world and Hollywood loves them, and their natural hair, melanin, and more.
To my black sisters, because it is blantantly clear you don't hear or see it enough, know your melanin is special, and beautiful in every way. Know you shouldn't have to hide, or hold back. Know your skin is as rich as the soil, your hair rising to absorb and kiss the sun, each strand perfect. Don't try to reach for approval, you're already crafted special the way you were intended. You are goddesses, bursting forward. Love yourself, know yourself, reach for the stars and heavens. Hell, reach for the galaxies if you desire.
My sisters, my fellow women, of every background everywhere, know you are just as perfect in every way. You are also goddesses. Don't bend to what society tells you to be. You are gorgeous, with your curves, your crazy hair, freckles, different shades, bodies shaped like Venus or not, and all your wonderful quirks. You are women, you are made naturally strong. The world can't handle you, cause you are the ones who made the world. Be true to yourself, aim your arrow, follow it, don't yield for no one. Never. Love each other, regardless of anything.
Men, know you don't have to follow society either. Know you are free to cry, to express yourself, to be as masculine or less masculine as you please, to explore your emotions and your sexuality. You don't have to be aggressive to be seen as male, you don't have to be emotionless to be strong. Be free to be, exist on your own terms, not on what the world says you should be or do.
Shit, that's all I gotta say.
XoXo, Razz
(Obviously the pictures belong to their respective sources)
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