Hair & Meditation

...I've been walking around with conditioner in my head for a whole week.

I have to confess, I did not mean for it to turn out this way. I flat-ironing my hair early last week, and enjoyed the novelty of straightish hair for a few days. But I have to admit, it got old REALLY fast. By day 2 it was swelling in the humidity and leaving it loose quickly became untenable. Last Thursday after class I jumped straight into the shower, reveling in the feel of water on my scalp and thanking the hair gods that my hair was curling up nicely. Not having the time to do anything else, I towel dried, and slapped on a boatload of conditoner. As an afterthought I sealed the ends with shea butter.

During the week I moved from wash an go 'fro, to a twistout, and limped towards the end of the week with buns. I've been spritzing every so often and monitoring my hair for signs of dryness. I have to say, I haven't had any problems at all with hair, it's been an easy week. Wish I could say the same about work.

As I was shampooing I started thinking about how simple things can make life so much better. I've always liked washing my hair, but a few weeks back Mr. J surprised me a while back by putting in one of those rain shower heads and now what was just a pleasant interlude became a fiercely guarded ritual. Hair day is the one day a week I indulge in the luxury of a long, hot shower, ruthlessly and with no remorse. The many jets disperse the water finely so I can revel in the clouds of steam rising in the bathroom and let the near scalding water power-wash the week's accumulated grime out of my pores. Sometimes I grab some spent grounds from the morning's coffee to do a (supposedly) cellulite-reducing exfoliation.Wash day is now spa day.

Does anyone else have a sort of ritual associated with hair? What have you done to enhance it? How do you think it benefits you? My hair day most definitely benefits my stress level - it helps me recharge to face another week.

Getting Going Again

Here I am, a job and life change later, picking up exactly where I left off.

A few people have suggested I stop clogging up their Facebook feeds by taking it to a blog (which they then dutifully promised to read, god bless them) so here I am again.

Where exactly is here? Hair here is a place I never imagined I'd get to - a place where I am knowledgeable about my hair's needs and comfortable with what is not so much a 'regimen' but a relaxed (ha, ha) routine that caters to both my hair and myself. I'm going to go ahead and take a quick moment to be smug here, I'm really proud of myself.

So, welcome to the conversation, everyone. We've come to talk hair, mostly - although those of you who know me know that I love rambling (and insane punctuation, among other things!)

I've gone through and updated my pages, so feel free to poke around and make yourself at home! Can we introduce ourselves in the comments so that we know who we've got at this party?

Hey, where did this APL come from all of a sudden?

I realise that this blog is turning out to be mostly my sporadic ramblings to myself, but I kind of like it. I get to rant and rave and obsess over the minute traumas and victories of my natural hair journey, and not that many people are exposed to my monumental self-absorption. (apologies to my five readers!!)

In any case, I've just come off a five-week hair rotation: two weeks of mini-twists, followed by a week of mixed "out" and bunned styles, followed by another two weeks of mini-twists. I'm cutting the 2nd twist rotation two days early because frankly I miss my hair and I needed to wear it loose for a few days.

Mini Twists out and facing a Dilemma

My mini-twists lasted twelve days! I could have made the whole two weeks, and probably even a third, but I told myself that it was time for a DC.

My scalp has hardly itched at all and I put that down 100% to the products I used to twist. I did use HEHH as my leave in, but apart from that there were no commercial products in my hair - I twisted with my shea-cocoa-jojoba mix and spritzed with water, jojoba and lavender oil for scent.

New beginnings

My hair and I continue our love-hate relationship, and over the past few months it's been hate all the way. I've been struggling with my thin, fine strands; anguishing over whether or not to trim, cut or chop it all away. The new year has given me the sense of a clean slate and I've taken a massive deep breath. The journey starts anew...

Water-free Hair Upkeep

Hi all,

2 weeks after the passage of Hurricane Tomas and I still have no pipe-borne water. I've been relying on my tank, and so have had to implement some serious water conservation measures. What does this mean for my hair? NO WASHING, NO DETANGLING!

That's right - my hair hasn't been washed for the past 14 days or so. Surprisingly, it's holding up quite well! It's not stinky, itchy, and my scalp isn't covered in buildup. I attribute that to my decision to switch to natural products as much as possible.

Since my detangling sessions always occur in the shower, with my hair loaded up with conditioner and each section detangled under the shower stream, my two weeks of bucket baths have meant that my hair hasn't seen a wide toothed comb in a loooong time. I haven't even combed out the twistout I was sporting last weekend. So am I a tangled mess?

Embracing The Natural

No, I don't mean my hair. My hair hasn't had a chemical service since February 2008. In the years since, I've been slowly figuring out the natural hair landscape, in terms of my hair care products. First I banned petroleum products from my moisturisers, stylers and gels. Then, I banned 'cones (although I do love me some amodimethicone from time to time now, Herbal Essence Hello Hydration, yeah!!). I'm now taking a hard look at all unpronounceable ingredients in my hair care products.

The Calm After the Storm

I don't even know how to resume my attempts at posting in the face of such an enormous rupture in the little cocoon I've built around my life. October 30th 2010 saw the passage of Hurricane Tomas across my little island in the sun. The death and destruction it's left in its path is unimaginable to my unashamedly sheltered self. It leaves me trembling to imagine the horror of those were consumed by mountains liquefying under their feet. Things hit so much harder when they're closer to, or rather, AT home - for sure.

Weekend Update & The Ressurection of Glycerin

I took down my twists for a twist-out on Friday, feeling quite guilty about leaving in the protective style for only 3 days. My hair felt awesomely soft, albeit a bit dry. I feel like I should have moisturised better when I did them on Tuesday - I'm still looking for the perfect moisturiser. I think I feel a mixing session coming on ... I just thought of the perfect ingredient!

Travels and Flax-Aloe Gel

I have been MIA for the past two weeks due to to a hastily scheduled business trip to the UK. While there, my schedule was hectic, and I didn't have the mental space to post. I had a good time, the weather (mostly) co-operated, and I got a great insight on how my hair functions in its stretched state.

Since I did not want to put my hair in twists, I spent the two weeks in various types of messy buns. I would moisturise and braid my hair at night, and in the morning just put it all up into a medium-sized satin scrunchie, making sure to tuck all my ends underneath. It really worked for me, especially since I ensured that I varied the placement of the buns so as not to stress my hair too much: low bun, high bun, side bun, rinse and repeat.

Self-esteem: A work in progress.

I had a thought-provoking experience today.

I met our representative for the Miss World pageant at the airport today. She was leaving for Beijing and I was dropping off some product she had ordered. I spotted her immediately - tall (the 4-inch platforms certainly contributed), lean, gorgeous, pale, with hair and legs for days. I was really struck by her beauty, and felt proud to know that we'd definitely be able to hold our own in the looks department of that competition.

Then it hit me - I was shocked! It had been so long since I had compared myself to another that at first I didn't realise what was happening. As I walked back to the car I felt short, dumpy, and unattractive. I thought my hair looked extra frizzy (my bad hair day wasn't helping the situation either) and I admit that I spent a moment or two wondering why I missed out on receiving the kind of genetic lottery jackpout payout that our beauty queen enjoyed.

When it all goes horribly wrong.

So guys,

I know I just wrote this morning about how I love my hair and it's so awesome, etc. Well, I lied. It's terrible. I'm exasperated.

Bad hair days happen to naturals too. When my hair was straight, a quick fix for a hair disaster was never more than a scrunchie away. Now that my hair is free to do its thing, however, without careful supervision it can run wild.

Hair

One of the main things I'll be talking about on this blog is my hair. I've had an extremely tumultuous relationship with my hair over the years, as I think many black girls have. We are conditioned to believe that natural hair is unruly, unmanageable, unkempt. We focus on the 'un', and try to 'correct' our hair using various processes. I've worn my hair in almost every conceivable way; straight, jheri-curl (let your SOUL GLOW!), braids, texturized. The only reason I have never installed a weave is because I just couldn't bring myself to spend so much money on mere hair.

Hello World!

I often find myself awake at odd hours of the night browsing natural hair blogs, contemplating new shades of eyeshadow, or combining the contents of my wardrobe in new, sometimes shocking ways. I figured I might as well make this time a bit more fruitful and explore my obsessions in productive ways.