The Awkward Silence

So, 2 weeks ago I decided to cut off my relaxed hair off. It wasn’t breaking. I wasn’t going through some kind of mid life crisis. I just decided I wanted to experience life in my natural hair. After over 20 years of either relaxing my hair or wearing it with a variety of wild and wonderful attachments, it felt long overdue!

The feedback I have have had has been phenomenal! Phenomenally mute that is. I have had comments like:

“You look like a plain Zimbo girl” to “It will take some getting used to…”
Then of course, I’ve had my refreshingly enthusiastic “team natural” girls telling me, “You’re still killing it!” or a favourite of mine, “Short hair don’t care “…. Outside of these few comments, its been almost uncomfortably quiet…

Somehow, I had expected the reception Lupita N’yongo has received. But, it seems off the Oscars stage, our natural God given hair is still a little too… unconventional.

I have walked into so many rooms and felt like there is a rainbow coloured elephant in the room, complete with bows and whistles that no one is willing to acknowledge.

On the whole, most people don’t say anything. Occasionally, one person will say “new hair?” – something I have now come to understand to be a rhetorical statement, uttered purely to take the edge off how uncomfortable they feel about not positively acknowledging my new hair. So much for my most dramatic hairstyle to date!

Today however, was different. A male colleague I hadn’t seen for a few weeks walked into the office and commented “oh, new hair?”. I gave my standard response about “trying something different” and to my surprise, he started walking towards me to engage further in this conversation. I wasn’t prepared for this…

He wanted to know why my hair had changed so drastically and then, in an open plan office full of people (OK 3 people, but still) he asked me “so have you been wearing a wig all this time???”. After I regained my composure, I went on to nonchalantly try and explain the structure of afro hair and the process involved in relaxing it. I think he sort of understood because he took a moment to consider what I had said and thoughtfully replied “So you’ve gone natural!”.

At this point, I was beaming! I felt completely satisfied that in my own small way, I was part of the movement. The movement to unashamedly educate people about being black without westernising myself “to make you feel more comfortable working with me”. I felt pleased.

However, nothing could have prepared me for what happened next. Without any warning, my male colleague with whom I have a VERY professional relationship asked “Can I feel it?”. Without waiting for my response, he reached over and touched my hair… at work… by my desk… like he was stroking a rare African antelope or some other wildlife.
“Mmm. It’s soft”, he lied.

And that ladies and gentlemen is a summary of my first two weeks as part of “team natural”. Many people have asked me how I feel since my big chop. “Is it weird?”, “you must be feeling liberated?” So far, its been all of the above!