First of all - I think it’s important to point out, if you don’t care about why I cut my hair (or think that a writing exercise such as this is self-important or self-indulgent), I would suggest reading something else that you’ll no doubt find more interesting. For those of you still reading, I say: this is actually about hair, so read on with caution. Don’t say I didn’t warn you!
Here we go…
I cut my hair and combed out the dreadlocks that I have joyfully and gratefully worn for a decade. It was crazy! It was stressful! It was freeing! So why did I do it? A few different reasons, but first, I want to explain why I locked my hair up in the first place.
A very quick history: my hair has been in knots since I was a kid, that is just how it prefers to be. As a young(er) woman I used leave-in conditioners, detangling combs, straighteners, etc., all with varying success. I’m sure that many of you reading know the products, and many of you know the frustration. What I didn’t realize was that all of this frustration with my hair was really covering for a frustration that I felt towards external societal standards placed upon me, that had sneakily woven their way into becoming internalized. This goes back to teenage years of insecurity, young adult years of never feeling thin or good enough - this goes deeper into my story than I care to share - but all this to say, a little over 10 years ago I had an epiphany. Was I frustrated with the need to have a “good hair day”? Yes. Was it impacting how I felt about my appearance? Yes. Was it making me view myself as “less than”? Yes. So why didn’t I just stop? Why didn’t I just let go of these expectations? Aha!
So, that summer of my epiphany, 10 years ago, after spending months living in the mountains of Oaxaca, Mexico, and regularly bathing in a waterfall where I was never able to untangle my hair (and never concerned or worried about it) - I decided to let it do its thing.
When I first locked up my hair, I noticed that people smiled at me a lot more. I thought that was interesting, and commented to a friend about it. She rightly pointed out: “I don’t think they’re smiling at you because of your hair, I think they’re smiling at you because of how much more comfortably you carry yourself underneath your hair.” I had disrupted a system of self-imposed negativity, and the confidence and joy were palpable. Yay!
So, here we are, a decade later, and one might ask - then why cut it off? I’ve got a few reasons that run a bit deeper than the most obvious one, which is: because I wanted to.
1) My neck and shoulders were affected by the weight. I didn’t notice at first, because hair grows slowly, but one day I noticed how loudly my neck was cracking…and it didn’t do that before. I also noticed my posture had shifted, and I carried my head forward over my neck to balance this weight. This is unhealthy for a lot of reasons, but it’s also an unhelpful posture for singing.
2) 10 years (to the day!), seemed like the perfect way to end an era. I felt good about the timeline, and I felt happy to have a decade to think about in this way. My hair had some treasures in it - beads that had been given to me, made for me, painted for me; it was like my hair was a living scrapbook I could use to keep these things, and therefore these people, close. I loved that feeling so much.
But with the physical weight, there was also an emotional weight, which may sound strange. I realized in the last few years that I wasn’t keeping my locs, but rather I wasn’t cutting them. A semantic difference, but an important one. To put it another way - I wasn’t actively keeping my hair locked, instead, I was resisting making a change. I had one dreadlock in particular that I was emotional about cutting. It carried a bead that I had worn for over 8 years, and the giver had since tragically died. It felt like I had to keep that bead, and that loc in order to stay connected to him. I was afraid what would happen to memories, stories, and my mental image of him without this connection.
But emotional weight eventually builds to a breaking point. I cannot be the sole carrier of memories for this loved one. It’s not sustainable, and it’s not expected. Many of his friends and family share that responsibility, and through our shared efforts of telling his stories we actively keep him alive. Once I had that awakening, actually believed it, and allowed myself the time to process that shift in responsibility, I felt ready. Not only ready, but excited for a change.
3) The big elephant in the room when a white woman discusses her dreadlocks is cultural appropriation. There are racial and cultural questions and discussions in 2020 that are different than in 2010, or 2000, and will be different tomorrow. And there are questions and discussions that are different in different spaces - when I’m walking around in Mexico, when I’m walking around on a Lakota reservation, when I’m walking my dog on a trail in Connecticut, when I’m performing at a music festival, or when I’m walking around at a Black Lives Matter demonstration.
I almost didn’t include this reason, because it is so sticky and sensitive. I’ve explained my hair story and my intentions, and I have had open and honest conversations with a lot of different people, with a lot of different skin colors, about my hair. Anytime I shared my hair story and my gratitude to my locs with anyone, it was received and respected. I state this here with such appreciation because I want to make it undoubtedly clear that I didn’t receive any pressure from anyone to change my hair. (It is, after all, my head.) And no one ever gave me a hard time for considering my hair to be more than “just hair.”
While my intentions and story have always been respected, there remains the fact that the only way to know my intentions or story is by hearing them. At first glance, on a first impression, assertions of cultural appropriation can certainly be made.
And I know there are lively and oftentimes heated debates on this very topic: Vikings wore dreadlocks, and ancient Egyptians, and different Indigenous groups, and, and, and… The fact still remains that there is a very specific conversation to be had about cultural appropriation in this time and this place. Regardless of how anti-racist you or I are learning to be (resources here for your reference), there is still the fact that I can wear my hair in dreadlocks and be accepted into a PhD program. Meanwhile, a teenage wrestler can be forced to have his hair cut off just so he can compete in a match. Or a young high school student can be denied walking in his graduation because his hair doesn’t comply with the dress code. Those are just facts.
I need to state that, because I don’t want it to seem like I was blissfully unaware for ten years. While I cannot be held responsible for the prejudice or behavior of others - I also cannot leave it unacknowledged. Thoughts of inequality and cultural appropriation were certainly on my mind as I made this decision.
To be honest, the depths of nuance necessary to have an actual conversation about and around cultural appropriation need more than a blog post, so I’ll wrap up reason #3 by saying: I loved my hair so much, and I am deeply grateful for the freedom and joy that it gave me for a decade. I’ve learned a lot in this last decade, and as silly as it many sound, my hair had a lot to do with it.
And now - some fun facts:
I just had my first haircut in over 10 years - and it just so happened to be during a pandemic, so that was weird
I haven’t had bangs since the second grade
It took three weeks and two bottles of conditioner to cut and comb out 51 locks (I did it at night, usually while watching re-runs of Law & Order)
My winter hats are all stretched out and waaaay too big
I had to go and buy a comb…literally didn’t have one anywhere
Combing my hair in the shower feels ah-mazing…hello, scalp massage!
I can use regular sized hair ties now, instead of headbands to hold my hair in a ponytail
My ponytail is so tiny and light (and so much COOLER) when I go running
I can wear a hood! (rain jacket, hoodie, winter in Toronto…this is very exciting)
People don’t recognize me! Between wearing a mask in public, and now this…
I’m sure I’ll keep discovering new things over the next days, weeks, and months, some fun and some less so (seriously, I did not remember how much hair falls out in the shower) but that’s what I’ve noticed so far. And there you have it - if you have arrived here at the end and are thinking: “Why did I read all of that? This was such a navel-gazing, vain, pontifical explanation all about hair!” My response to you is: I warned you at the beginning!
I should also let you know that if you feel the urge to tell me how much better I look now, or how much better I looked before - go ahead, but just know that I’ve heard both responses already, so your opinion has already been covered. Huzzah! Time saved!
Wishing you all well on your own hair journeys - whatever that may look like for you!
Love, a happy-headed Kristen