PaprikaProse.com

Published in The Westchester Review (Volume 3); 2009

Ever since I was very young, my mother straightened my kinky hair.  I have a vague recollection, when I was seven or eight, of my mother admonishing me to sit still while she carefully coaxed a hot, iron comb through my nappy hair and then replaced it on the stove’s eye to reheat.

“It smells badly,” I complained, as I watched the smoke dance away from the burning hot comb towards the ceiling out of the corner of my eye.

“Bad.  Or awful,“ she corrected me. My mother was very proper and well educated and she insisted her children speak with correct English grammar. “It’s the smell of the oils in your hair.”

She continued, “Be still, honey.  I’m almost done.”  Done. Done re-fashioning my hair in the image of others . . . and a beauty . . . so prevalent during that time.

But, mostly what I remember are the relaxers.  A rite of passage in every young black girl’s life.  A time to emerge from the plaits and pigtails of a duckling as a graceful swan.  Or as a fairy tale princess with long, weightless flowing hair.   Every six weeks or so, my mother would set aside several hours on Saturday to pin me between her knees and work thick, white cream like  mayonnaise through the roots of my hair. I knew better than to squirm or complain:  for there is a prescribed amount of time the cream can stay in your hair without it burning your scalp and taking out your hair completely.  Working fast and without distractions, my mother combed then smoothed the cream across my curly roots until they relaxed into straight strand submission.  Finally, she rinsed my hair out over the kitchen sink and rolled it in curlers for me to sit under our bonnet dryer.  I would emerge an hour later, hair falling in ringlets across my shoulders, ready to “wear it down” for Sunday school and church the next day. If I was lucky, and neither sweat nor rain ruined my hair, I could wear it down all week.

Only once in my life did I free my hair of salon and home styling and wear it naturally. When I was 12 years old, I sported an afro the size of a large beach ball for well over a year.  In spite of its size, my afro was easy.   I washed it, air-dried it and combed it with a pik. My hair, in combination with bell-bottom jeans whose tattered hems I purposefully walked over, officially made me a child of the 70s.

That same year, my light-skinned mother wore a reddish-brown afro wig.  Hers was pretty big too.  Every day, she left our largely white suburb and dutifully drove to her job as a chemist at Walter Reed Army Medical Hospital in suburban Maryland.  Some days, she wore the afro wig and other days, she styled her own hair in a short bob.  I still remember the summer we spent at my grandfather’s house in Mississippi:  gruffly, he muttered disparagingly about the beach ball atop my head, calling it “ugly” and “unattractive for a girl as pretty as you.”  My mother and her father fought a lot about afros that summer.  I wondered if he was a part of the reason my mother started wearing a wig in the first place.

My father was much darker-skinned than my mother.  She said she chose him on purpose so that she would have beautiful brown babies and kids wouldn’t tease them and call them “banana skin” like they had her.  He was an architect working as an urban planner in cities like Atlanta, Newark and Boston, boiling over with hatred and black pride.  Every evening, our dinner table became his bully pulpit to lecture us on the racial and political icons of the day:  Martin Luther King, Jr., Angela Davis, Julian Bond and Malcolm X.  We were our own private “salon.”

On many evenings, from our dining room picture window, we watched the hippies who lived two houses away from us park their run-down, psychedelic minibus in front of our curb instead of theirs.  My mother said there probably were too many cars and too many long-haired, pot-smoking friends in front of their own house.  After dinner, we would retreat to our living room to read or watch the news.  If my homework was done, sometimes I listened to the radio and sang all the words along with James Brown, “Say it loud, I’m Black and I’m proud.”

As a teenager and for almost thirty years afterwards, I kept my hair long and straight again, processed by successive relaxers.  I curled it every day and wore it loose and long down my back or pulled it back in a ponytail or bun whenever it became crinkled and unmanageable.   I think I simply preferred the flexibility, but maybe I also thought I looked prettier with long hair.  Just as I had thought when I was transformed into a fairy tale princess as a young girl.   I spent hours at the hairdresser when it was time for another relaxer. If it rained, my hair got frizzy and I had to curl it again or make another trip to the hairdresser.  When my hair became damaged from extensive processing or simply thinned as I grew older, I spent even more time with my hairdresser who weaved in extensions so I could continue to wear a long-haired look.

So, when I met and married my husband, my hair was long.

“She is just like a Pakistani girl, Ammi,” he assured his mother in his effort to wear down her resistance to our marriage.  “You will see,” he promised.

It was true that I did not match the future his parents had designed for their eldest son.  Every single thing his family had, had gone into producing a successful boy like him — combed, well-educated, obedient, their best bet in the world.  He and his future with his sari-wrapped, chignon-styled wife were to shower good fortune on all the rest:  sisters’ marriages, younger brother’s studies and parents’ old age in America. Consciously, he argued in defense of my many attributes that would help to realize at least some of their dreams for him.  Unconsciously, he must have assumed my hair was part of the parade – the parade of ready-to-marry Pakistani girls before prospective husbands and their families, displaying their talents and showcasing their accomplishments, charm and beauty.

But one unremarkable day in October several years ago, I cut off my long hair and returned home with a short, wavy style reminiscent of Halle Berry.  Like all women at some point in their lives, there was a part of me that probably wanted to be like her.  I wanted her universal appeal.  I wanted her spunk.  And I wanted the glamorous, exciting life that practically jumped off of the pages of her Revlon magazine advertisements.  Perhaps, I was just . . . . simply, bored.  Or perhaps, I needed a boost that day — something that would make me feel young and edgy in my otherwise suburban and middle-aged life as a wife and mother.    Unfortunately, my husband was completely unprepared for the change.  In fact, I had no intention of cutting my hair when I left home that morning, although I had fantasized out loud about it several times over the last year.  He erupted in anger when he saw my new look.  And for a long time afterwards, I dodged a hurtful hail of commentary about my hair style.

“I can’t stand what you’ve done to your hair,” he said, walking up the stairs to change out of his suit one evening. He sounded as if he were announcing the particular terms of a deal to one of his partners at work.   He grimaced when looking at me, like a boxer sparring in the rink, waiting for me to take the bait.

“I understand you don’t like it, “ I replied.  “But I do.  Besides, it is only hair and it’s just for a change. I needed to do something different.”

I wanted my husband to ask me why I needed to do something different.  I wanted him to understand that my life had become somewhat uninspired in spite of the hullabaloo of the kids and our home.  And, I wanted him to appreciate how much I resented the wasted time styling my hair instead of enjoying our family and my hobbies, exercising and relaxing. I resented the importance of hair.  I waited.  But there was no softening of his tone or easing of his stiffened movements away from me.

“It looks hideous.”

“ You may not like my hair but it is not hideous.  It’s just your personal preference.  Other people say it looks nice.   Even your family thinks it looks great,” I offered, attempting to bridge any cultural gap that might be affecting our differing perceptions of the same thing.  The fact was I didn’t know for sure what his family thought.  But I had not overheard any whispered criticism and they still smiled and greeted me warmly whenever we met.   While I knew plenty of men preferred their women to have long hair, I thought few that I knew would have reacted so severely to a change to short hair. Tears streamed down my face.  I was angry.  I was hurt.

“I don’t care what anyone else thinks.  You’re my wife!” My husband really was worked up now and his voice rose to an stratospheric irrationality.

I couldn’t believe we were fighting about hair.  That our relationship was being tested because of my haircut. It seemed to me to be such an unimportant skirmish in the battle over meaningful cultural and gender differences – nothing like religion, in-laws, or even children.  Incredibly, my hair was to become the straw that would break the camel’s back.  And I decided to allow the camel to gasp its last breath, with its legs giving way, crumbling under the weight of it all.  I was tired.  I no longer wanted to struggle to be me instead of the person he had created in his head.

I realized then that perhaps my husband’s reaction was a reflection of his desire to control what I did with my appearance and his image of me.  It is his personality to be less comfortable with change than I am.  But it was also cultural. Not because all Pakistanis have long, silky straight hair.  Many cut their hair short.  And some have wavy, curly or downright nappy hair. But, it was cultural because he came undone when I failed to perform the WIFE role as written in his life’s play script:  I had not deferred to him and what was pleasing or important to him in changing my appearance and seemingly, I had not cared about or loved him enough to keep what he preferred.  Long hair helped to define my essence as a woman, wife and lover.  Long hair meant pretty, sexy and acceptable to him.

My husband’ s reaction was also an ugly reflection of what society had taught us both was attractive.  As ashamed as I was to admit it, on some level, long hair had meant pretty, sexy and acceptable to me too.  Old-fashioned ways of thinking — reinforced by our fairy tales and storybooks, advertising and corporate cultures — continually surface and influence our perspective and opinions. Unknowingly, my husband had charged blindly into a minefield of historic tension amongst people of color worldwide – those with fair skin and “good” hair and those without.

Sometimes I worried he might be right.  Secretly, I checked and re-checked myself in the master bath, hallway and powder room mirrors.  What if I really had messed up how I looked, as my husband claimed?  Was I really less attractive now?  Privately, I cried hopelessly when he was most unsupportive and applied salve to my wounds by reminding myself that while attractive, my husband was no Bollywood movie star.  I dredged down deep to tap reservoirs of confidence and stamina to keep from falling into a dark hole of self-doubt.  And, every time I lost my footing, I clawed my way back up to stand my ground.

But the fact was my hair had never looked better.  It had never been healthier: fuller, shinier, more resilient.  And I had never felt better about the way I looked.  I realized my haircut had nothing to do with my husband, his preferences, and most importantly, my love for him or care for his feelings.  It was all about me.  It was my right to style my hair as I pleased.  It was mine.

Some time later, I realized that except for the color of my skin, my long hair allowed me to be anyone my husband wanted me to be.  In his mind, I was no different than a Pakistani girl.   I did, in fact, share his family’s moral values on family, respect, religion and education. But, the cutting of my hair made it difficult for him to look at me and see the woman, not the girl, in me.  I was poised, attractive, smart and articulate.  But many others did not expect these attributes from an African-American.  And, like these other attributes, long hair helped me to appear racially more neutral and acceptable. My new, short hair, however,  made it difficult for my husband to look at me and not see my blackness, especially when I left my hair to curl naturally and softly frame my brown face.  I was no longer an empty vial waiting for some identification.

Then one day, the commentary on my hair stopped.  Just like the unremarkable day when I cut it, one unremarkable day months later, after we had been out with friends, my husband said, “You look pretty tonight.”

He never mentioned it but I accepted that his compliment included my hair.  I knew that it was too difficult for him:  he was too proud to ever talk to me about his initial reaction to my haircut.  Yet I was surprisingly happy I didn’t need him to admit anything.  I loved my new hair and the person I was on the inside and out.  And I loved having the freedom to wear my hair short now and perhaps . . . just perhaps, long again later.  As long as I was the one to choose.