'fro-lette

i can't fight it anymore.

my hair has officially evolved into a big, untameable 'fro-like entity. it lacks the symmetry and firmness of a traditional 'fro, true. instead, it's just a big curly mess. emphasis on big.

because my mother was deeply afraid of 'bad' hair (she was asian - what did she know of nappy hair!) she was obsessed with conquering my hair's curl. her battle had the fierceness of a colonizing force bent on crushing indigenous insurgents and converting them all to christianity.

my hair was heathen and she was its savior. she relaxed it, cut it, set it, wrestled with it, braided it, cried over it, wrenched it, curled it, blow dried it and cursed over it until she finally had to give up in defeat. algerian freedom fighters had nothing on my unruly hair.

for a while, even i wanted to conquer my hair. it was too big. it had too much wildness to it. it cast its own shadow. it didn't lay down, it was frizzy, it misbehaved. it got in the way during sex. in fact, my hair was downright unromantic. instead of artful tousledness after a bout of amour, my hair was electrified, bushy, splayed, aggressively present. it didn't glide silkily over my lovers; it attacked and interfered with them. they had to push it out the way. it annoyed the hell out of me.

but after the expense of blow drying my hair straight became too much, i just let it go. i got tired of the disapproving stares the other stylists would give as my faithful hair wench sweated and toiled with a round brush and red-hot blowdryer in hand over my head. besides, curiosity was high. what was my mom afraid of? was my hair really unmanagable? was it really so out of control?

yes.

it is utterly unmanagable. it defies taming. i cannot make it behave and it will not fit under a hat.

my niece has hair like this. when i visit, i can't help but giggle at her curly black/filipino/mexican head of hair. it's a wild fuzzy little black dandelion. i know that hair, i know that halo of frizz; i know the hair band's stinging snap when it can't go around a ponytail. i know what it's like to want to look cool and demure instead of like you've been pulled through the underbrush backward. i want to tell her that there's no such thing as 'good' hair, that it'll never be straight, that it makes her interesting to have hair that invites comment.

i want to tell her there's something imminently freeing about standing on a street corner in chicago, the wind whipping at your body, and your hair undulating around your head, waving to passersby, announcing itself while everything else stands still.