To all of you who are supporting my blog…THANK YOU!!! I am sharing my story with hopes it will be an inspiration to some and encouragement to others to find an anchor and hope in Jesus. He has been mine for a very long time.

My hair has been a focus of my attention since eighth grade. Up until that time, it was in an array of parts and plaits in every direction my mother could find. There were a few ladies who would come from time to time to our house to get their hair done (pressed with a hot comb and curled), but my mother never had time to do the same for me. I was literally at her mercy…and mercy I needed because my hair was long. I was told I had “bad” hair because it would shrink something terrible when wet and it took a lot of effort to get it untangled to be braided. I don’t remember her ever brushing it out, but holding it at the root and combing, combing, pulling, combing…while sitting on the floor between her knees. I don’t know what hurt more, sitting on the hard floor for what seemed like hours or her seemingly pulling my hair out of my skull…and you dare not cry. It was even worse when she would stop to get back to it later….that can only be described as torture.

On the plains of Alabama, my hair was considered “nappy” or bad hair as opposed to “good” hair. It was a stigma given at an early age to be worn just as having a dark completion. You didn’t want either. Every effort was made to have good hair (straightening it) and not being black. (Many tubes of Artra Skin Tone Cream were being applied to lighten faces.). When my mother did attempt “do” my hair or straighten it, along with it were burnt ears from the hot comb and her using (Royal Crown Hair Dressing…a petroleum-based hair dressing that is greasy and has a wonderful shine) . Using Royal Crown meant having straight hair for some time, but then came wash day. I dreaded it as much as my mother because it also meant my hair would remain in parts and plaits for a long time…walking around with “nappy” hair and that led to an event that changed everything.

Here I was in the eighth grade and around high school students who shared the same building. What happened early on is the reason why I became obsessed with my hair.

We were living in the “shot gun” house at the time. I had begged my mother for bangs that were becoming very popular at school. She was quite frank to say I would not be getting bangs…you didn’t want short “nappy” hair. I wanted to be like the other girls (another lesson I learned to avoid) so I kept asking. She finally cut my hair for bangs.

One weekend, my mother washed my hair, but she didn’t straighten it out. Now my mother (to her credit) did not accept any excuse for not going to school be it real or feigned. “You will go to school.” There it was a Sunday evening, getting closer and closer to going to school the next day and my hair was in its washed state. “Momma, are you going to ‘straighten’ my hair? I would have been better off not asking because she only straightened the bangs. I had to go to school with the rest of my hair ‘nappy’. It’s funny now as I write this, but I can’t even describe the horror and humiliation of that day at school…everyone made fun of and laughed at me. I was the brunt of every passing comment that could be made for having “straighten bangs and a “nappy head”. I left school determined not to return the same way.

My mother was home during the day and went to work when I got home from school… that meant no extra curricular school activities for me; however, I took advantage of her being away to straighten my own hair. It took me a while to make sure the hot comb was not too hot to burn my hair (a real possibility) but I ‘straighten’ my own hair and curled the bangs. I continued to do my own hair from that day forward…learning how to manage it even more from others at school. Over time, I took on my sister’s hair and when we were alone, I cut my brothers’ hair.

Fast forward many years later after chemically treating my hair to straighten it, cutting my hair, coloring my hair…dark auburn, light auburn, light brown,, dark brown, black. I even took the deep plunge while still in a corporate environment and got micro braids. All of this was to make sure my hair was up par and the way it looked was accepted by others…never to be laughed at again. That acceptance was at a very high price and time consuming. I once heard your hair is you ‘crown and glory’ and I treated it that way…but is your hair really your ‘crown and glory’? A mission trip to Namibia, Africa and a tour of Etosha National Park changed my way of thinking.

At the end of the tour as the sun was beginning to set, we came to a watering hole deep enough to wade with a shallow end. A short while after arriving, a herd of elephants began to approach. They were the largest elephants I had ever seen…seemingly as large as railroad boxcars. They were so large I asked if we would be able to escape if one came charging. There was a quiet order within the herd. The males went in for a stroll through the water followed by the female. The males stood watch a short distance away for any predators or another herd of elephants. There was a baby elephant following along side its mother. When she exited, it could not get out of the water. After several attempts to get her baby out of the water, she raised her trunk and let out a trumpet sound for help. The other female elephants came rushing over and immediately saw the problem and began to help. The baby kept sliding back down in the water (having too much fun) until it was moved down to the shallow end where it walked out alone with ease…mother waiting for him to exit. After exiting, the baby elephant was pushed gently along to a sandy area where the mother used her trunk to sand its back. We sat for almost two hours watching these elephants communicate with each other and doing what they were created to do.

As we left the park, I sat quietly in the back of the vehicle thinking about what I had witnessed. The elephants were huge, their skin rough, wrinkled and dry, their ears very large and odd shaped and then there is the long enormous nose called its trunk an extension of their face. God created them. (“And God made the beasts of the earth according to their kinds and the livestock according to their kinds, and everything that creeps on the ground according to its kind. And God saw that it was good,”.) Genesis 1:25 ESV The elephants were still doing everything they were created by God to do. For whatever reason, I thought about my obsession with my hair (even for the mission trip). I had noticed how the ladies there in Africa didn’t appear to be overly concerned about their hair, albeit always neat. Some wore beautiful head coverings…but not because they were ashamed of their hair…a tradition.

Before leaving Namibia, I thought what it would be like to leave my hair alone and let it be as God had created it. (“So God created man in his ow image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them. And God saw everything that he had made, and behold, it was very good”) Genesis 1:27, 31 ESV. God sees in me what is good…very good. I was not created with “bad” or “nappy” hair. That was a stigma to keep me from being all God created me to be while trying to win the acceptance and approval of man. In my departing the soil Namibia, I made a commitment to God to never use another chemical on my hair. In doing so, I could be out in any weather condition…rain, sleet, snow, sun, wind without having to be concerned about my hair. It looks, just as the elephants demonstrated without saying a word, as God created it to be.

Today, my hair type is better defined as “4C” (very tight coiled curls, often described as the tightest curl pattern, with high shrinkage potential) and along with that definition, a move within my culture to see natural hair as beautiful and to be worn with pride…just as it is to be black and proud.

I no longer see my hair as my “crown and glory” as I so readily and flippantly said so many times in the past. Scripture says, (“…everyone who is called by my name, whom I created for my glory, whom I formed and made”) Isaiah 43:7 ESV We were all created to bring glory to God. In doing so, (“Blessed [happy, spiritually prosperous, favored by God] is the man who is steadfast under trial and preserves when tempted; for when he has passed the test and been approved, he will receive the [victor’s] crown of life which the Lord has promised to those who love him.”] James 1:12 AMP

I leave you with this thought. We all fall into doing things we see or think important to please ourselves and others around us…or society as a whole. Unfortunately, and I think you will agree, in every attempt, we are never satisfied, and feel the need to try something new and different…coming up short every single time. In our doing, it becomes a viscous cycle and we totally forget who created us and who we were created to be…and whose breath we breathe every single day. (“The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.”). Acts 17:24-25 ESV Even though we fall short, Scripture reminds us, (“if we are faithless, he remains faithful for he cannot deny himself”). 2 Timothy 2:13 ESV. God never gives up on us!!! He has never given up on me…”This I Know”.

Here’s the irony of it all. After years of spending how much money on products and tools to straightened my hair, I get far more compliments with it being natural, greying and short. I like to think God is pleased with my decision.

Vivian