Not all babies are born with a head full of hair. I know, because I was one of them. I was a bald-headed baby. Well at least in the baby photo I stuck on here. Of course, my hair grew in when I was still an infant and has been growing since. I’ve had it cut short before into a style. But that was once. There’s only one person I trust to cut my hair and that’s a lady named Jackie who used to work at the salon in JC Penney in Austin, TX. I’m not sure if she still works there. I heard she got her own now. She’s what I call a divine hairstylist. If you’re ever in ATX, look her up. I’ll find out what her last name is and will update this post.

I decided to go natural a wee bit over two years ago. I’ve got a few reasons why. But my primary reason was because I thought it would be less maintenance. Psh, boy was I wrong! HA! The other reasons were wanting a new look …and feel, and the other was I really liked the idea of going natural with my hair since natural I am. Most people cut their hair when they make that decision to stop ‘relaxin’ their hair. Not me. I walked around with it growing out; I made it work because I wasn’t going to cut it. You should see some of the pictures. Like the back would be all natural and the top would still be relaxed. It was quite funny actually. I don’t know why it was quicker for the hair in the back of my head to get natural and the top part took longer. I was sort of experimenting seeing how long it would take to release all that chemicals from the relaxer to be in its natural state. Funny thing, I don’t even remember. Well I suppose it took about 3 months. Really I don’t recall.

Since it’s been free of relaxer crap, I’ve had it in different ways like short twists, long twists, braids (my own hair and not some fake hair added to it), shaped afro, wild ‘fro and so on. People have asked me if I was going to lock it and obviously the answer to that question is NO. If I were the kind of person who liked the same ol’ same ol’ then sure I’d lock it. But I like variety and there’s only so much you can do with locked hair. So that was never an option for me. Now locking it and keeping the style of it for a little bit of time (like less than a month) and then un-locking it would be fine by me. But keeping the style permanently; oh I don’t think so.

It would take me about two hours to put my hair in twists, depending on how thin the twists were. I’ve had the chunky kind and the very thin kind. I’d usually do it by first finding a very great and long movie to watch. That way I’d be “distracted”. So it would give me the illusion that the time just flew by when it really didn’t. Yea I said it. I deliberately “tricked” my mind into thinking one thing in order to accomplish another — I know me. Because it always seemed like right when I had like a little bit left then I’d start getting anxious and impatient. For those who know, ya’ll know what I’m talking about. When your arm gets tired and the sound of your fingers twisting and fingernails hitting each other as it twists making that tick-tick-tick sound — gets louder and louder as if it’s the only sound in the room and your neck is starting to hurt and your leg starts shaking in an impatient manner like a person pacing the floor. It’s like “HURRY UP ALREADY!” Ugh! You know what I’m talking about. The movies I’d watch were generally those medieval type films; those seemed to have real good length and were very interesting to watch. There was one time I decided to watch Forrest Gump since it was really the only thing on TV at the time I was in the mood to do my hair. And so was hoping that it wouldn’t take me the whole movie to twist it up. Well the movie ended and guess what? You guessed right. I was still twisting my hair and there wasn’t any other movie on TV to watch. So I was left that particular night having to do the rest of my hair watching garbage. And that just made me even more anxious; took about 45 minutes to do.

Looking Back: You know, I recall at time when I had relaxed hair — I went somewhere and this lady I knew, she gave me a hug and pulled downward on my hair to see if it was weave. You know just because a lot of brown-skinned women put weave and whatnot in their hair, don’t mean all of them do. Because I don’t. Terrible I have to actually pinpoint that out. I remember my senior year when I went to prom, my friend’s mom did my hair. And it wasn’t until I got to the prom when my head started itching. And I was like, “Why is my head itching like this?” It was seriously itching. When I finally got home I was undoing my hair and what did I find?! Some da$@ weave. Yea, his mother snuck some weave in my hair. Don’t ask me how I didn’t know. I was too focused on trying to stay awake. The fake hair wasn’t actually connected to my hair, more like it was wrapped in the top part of the style. I was like ‘i-oo’ not ew. I can’t stand weave. If it’s not hair connected to my head already then keep it out of my hair. Simple as that. I just don’t like it and she knew it. I wasn’t mad at her but do you think I let her touch my hair again?! Naw, I’m playing. That wasn’t the reason why. I know you thought it was. But it’s not. That was just a one-time hookup for that evening. She offered to do my hair so I let her. She used to be a hairstylist but it didn’t cost me anything for her to do my hair.

Anyway, back to this bald thing. I’ve been considering for almost a year now to shave it all off as a means of cleansing and completion. I’ve done a lot of divine self-therapy over the passed year and feel the timing to cut it all off would be perfect - more now than when I first considered going bald. I’ve accomplished a lot in my “therapeutic” sessions. Well I helped a lot of people in my days. So much so, where some were calling me their own personal counselor and calling me at all hours. But I allowed it until one day I stopped it and decided to work on me since I really didn’t have anyone to call my “personal counselor” — and ’sorry’ but “Jesus” just wasn’t cuttin’ the cake — no offense. Always there for folks and nobody really wanted to be there for me. I know I attempted to talk with people but they’d somehow change the subject to be all about their problems within a minute’s time. Shame. Even counselors need counseling, too, sometimes. I tried talking to whom the problem concerned and they all seemed to respond the same way — surprisingly — saying “You’ve got issues” or “You need to talk to someone.” I mean WTF is that?! Just absurd. But apparently they’re just people not liking to be confronted with an issue they aren’t ready to deal with themselves. So couldn’t talk with them either without them blowing me off. I was left to deal on my own because I da@$ sure couldn’t depend on people. And I made the best of it. Anyway, I felt since I have helped many of all ages — young and old all around the world (to folks that spoke English anyway - broken or fluently) and in my local area wherever I’d be — then why not use my own advice for myself, right?! Can’t say all of the advice worked for me, though. But I was able to be objective, stepping outside of myself and literally treating myself like a patient. I’d record my sessions on tape and video and recorded notes down in a journal and workbook. Yea I went ALL out. If I’m going to work on me I might as well do it right from the start, right?! And I might as well do it thoroughly otherwise it wouldn’t be as effective as it could be. So I yea I did the whole nine. It was interesting and kind of fun, too. Dug up old bones and stuff I thought were dead and man it was quite the experience. It was aaaaaaaaaalllll about ME. And if people find that as selfish me choosing to cut everyone off for a time to work on me and be with me after several years of being there for others, well then that’s perfectly fine I’M SELFISH and PROUD TO BE! Now deal with it. I’m very pleased with the results overall. Talk more about that in another entry some day — maybe. And well now that I’ve reached completion (it’s not like I had a lot of “junk” — compared to most I’ve encountered, I’m a ‘goody two shoe’ and don’t mind that I am. Because others also look at me as such, I tend to shock them when I tell them I have a problem; few don’t even take me seriously when I say so — no kidding). Well, I’ve arrived in my moment of achievement and I’d like to top it off with going bald entirely. Just shave off all of my hair.

Some people are out to “save the world”. If each and every person would start with just their own SELF, I wonder how the world would be. You can’t “save” ‘em all but you can save one and that one is YOU. So work on that and naturally the world surrounding will change, too.

I came into this world bald and maybe I’ll go out the same.

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