Bvudzi Rangu || vu:dzi r∧ngu: || My Hair

Author’s Note: The title is in Shona, the phonetic version of the phrase, and then the phrase in English, this is to represent the idea of more ways than one. My mom would say “It’s actually very special hair, our hair” whenever I needed that reminder, and it got to a point I so often did. I wondered what our curls would say. I wanted to pick up characteristics, patterns, and a story from the words people uttered to me. I started by saying Black hair, but ultimately did not include the phrase in my piece. And even now I don’t see the issue with identifying my hair, that grows on my head, with the color of my skin and the draw of my lineage. Though I challenged myself in this piece, I had heard someone who didn’t look like me say “Black girl hair,” I took notice of what she looked like and compared that to her verbiage, her intonation, and her tone and the phrase took on another level of meaning for me. That observation guided me to want to write in a way that separated hair from the individual, but the intersection still be written as a relationship. The descriptions I used still signify the make and the construction of my hair, where it originated from, the culture, the history, and the evolution. I wanted to describe the hair, break it down to show how it’s physical attributes require a different type of care and ritual. Hair does not speak, but this story comes from facts, it’s from the perspective of me as a woman of color, a Black woman, and other Black women that I’ve spoken to and their experience. I create one similar narrative as a Black woman, giving hair a fitting tone, it is an extension of me and them. For this piece I thought — my hair is penalized for falling outside of Eurocentric norms because of the legacy of colonization, it’s been put down so why mustn’t it speak.

She stands in front of the mirror, and I am there with her, growing from her root outward, downward, up, around, whatever direction my map is to lead me to.

***

There are different types of bodies of hair: straight, loose curls, tight curls or coils, kinky. With even more characteristics if you dive into each one.

I am kinky, textured, curly. What is the difference if you see me? Curly hair is simply a spiral or wave while kinky hair has a torsion twist.

My body, the strands, turn around themselves.

Kinky hair is curly hair but not all curly hair is kinky.

It’s a word to describe a type of curly hair, used for textured patterns like me, and most often associated with curl patterns that are on the higher end of the scale. These are the tightest of the bunch and often require more and slightly different care than others.

***

As she looks at her black skin and me, I am there. Starting at the sink with a spray bottle, she sprays me with warm water to put some conditioner on each of my sections. Her hands and a wide tooth comb are what she uses. One a part of body that knows me well, the other a utensil I befriended a long time ago. She combs through each section starting at the bottom and holding me tight. She works her way up to the root, and then comes back down through my strands. Then she wraps me around myself, I am hugging my body tight to be joined with a butterfly clip.

She took her time, whole head covered .

I am what’s natural, the significance and resistance of my body, her hair. Tightly coiled strands, I see her hand with every ounce of outside remanence.

Ch ch ch shhhhhhhhhhhhh

She steps into the shower and fixes the head to the perfect angle; she is going to take her time.

Water soothes me. The hot steam opens my cuticles. I tighten and shrink my curly body as she takes each clip out; I drink as I feel the droplets start on scalp and go down through me. She looks at the shampoos. The choice between moisturizing or clarifying is the start. Am I being fed avocado, mint or rosemary, maybe fig, these are the things found natural to the Earth that nourish body parts: nails, organs, mind, hair. These natural elements contain nutrients. This shampoo, artificial or organic — up to her, what she knows about me and where we connect.

***

This is her now, her experience with washing me, but there are other experiences. I am conscious of other curls shaped similar, but not quite, to me.

***

In a place like Zimbabwe where bodies look like mine, I am washed simply with bar soap called sunlight — known as a washing bar for laundry, a multiuse bar, natural. It cleans me in the ways needed, clarifying, stripping me of all the products that I had. Green or brown with a clean earthy smell and I sense something strong in there… is it added? When you use the bar, you wash me extra good to avoid pieces being left, interrupting the plan you have for me that follows, a thoughtful plan. It takes time and energy, thought to wash me, a conscious practice.

In the village, what’s around is scarce buts it’s also livelihood. Feso is in Zimbabwe, it’s in the village, a natural herb and it stays that way. Put between two hands, natural combs, it lathers and cleans me just as well. Although a herb, it has cleaning properties, you would be surprised what Mother Earth can provide. I stay thick, I stay nourished.

Depending on where you are, you fix your shower head, or you turn the faucet, or you heat up your water in a pot and you bring it to a bucket. I want you to understand it’s a conscious practice.

***

Now, she washes her hands with a bar of gold soap, she’s thinking while also feeling free, my wet strands not bonded to anything, so they feel every inch of the water, the steam. Through waves I feel the thought of the process she’s about to undertake. She turns around to face the shower head as she washes her hands.

She splits me into sections again and grabs the shampoo. With one hand she holds the bottle over me, I feel the runny liquid yet to be lathered. She puts some in her hands and puts the bottle down and begins to emulsify it so that the soap can be throughout.

Gentle hands approach me. They land in the bountifulness that is my thick coat, a circular movement dances around scalp, twirling me in with her fingertips. She scratches and rubs and dislodges the dirt while encouraging the flow and connectivity of body and hair.

Go through it once and rinse it.

The second time is where we see that good lather, because all of the substance has been rinsed out from the first shampoo. After the second wash she wrings me out with her hands.

As she soaks body, she takes the conditioner again, emulsifies it and puts it on me bottom to top. The wide tooth comb helps put the conditioner in me, as she combs from top to bottom, clipping me in sections after.

She does what she needs to clean body while I sit in the product. When she’s done she turns down the temperature to rinse the conditioner out with cooler water to close and seal my cuticles. I feel her fingers run through me.

She’s quenched my so-called thirst.

She turns off the shower and takes a deep breath. The woman stays in there long enough for the inside of her fingertips to wrinkle.

She steps out of the shower; I am hugging myself as I have shrunken to relish with scalp. The more coiled my body the higher the shrinkage. My most special characteristic is shrinkage because no other hair type with the exception of curly types can do it. How I shrink indicates my health; if I stretch and shrink back into my original state, I am healthy.

I am dripping water, gleaming at what has made me glow. The water droplets, although they consumed me are also attached to my strands, they sit on top of me. She uses a microfiber towel since they are designed to create less friction, the friction of a regular towel raises me and causes a frizz out reaction.

She walks to her room, letting me sit

bundled up.

***

Hair artist Tiolu Agoro expresses that I am in fact fragile, I break easily which is why my care is important. I demand a process filled with consistency, simplicity. You don’t want to disturb my Ph, avoid alkaline and stay on the acidic side, by the way the perfect balance is 5.5. Yes, I came from what is natural, so I thrive in what is natural but I also acknowledge time has changed. Natural is met with “formulated by a chemist,” they as well as hairstylists have the knowledge, those who take time to study me know me. There are myths about not using grease and sulfates, but when you break it down derivatives of derivatives, things can work for me, advised professionally of course.

I am individualistic, but I connect with others like me. A learning curve to preserve crown and culture.

***

Now, after washing me she relieves me from the bundle, catching me before I completely dry. The woman is about to moisturize my densely, coiled, soft rings with oil and cream. This is a method of layering products, starting from scalp to the root, to the tip, working in generously to maximize hydration and keep it LOCed in, connecting scalp and me. Without all of this, even with it if it’s too much, I become dull. I have a body with structures. The shape of my follicles determines my curliness, with each individual curl, they are hers in particular.

The woman is in Pittsburgh, there is a home in Zimbabwe, there are bodies like mine everywhere.

***

On the head of a human body, covering the African Diaspora, I am created and structured with purpose and with thought. It’s been spoken, it’s been proven, of the chemical differences I possess. I am tangled differently than that of my counterparts but that was intentional, those differences in my making they should just be part of this story and nothing that should outwardly restrict me. My curl pattern, the zigzag or motion of the strands, my body is never fully circular. The difference is in the waves, the curls or the kink, and the bonding pattern.

Describe it to me Hair?

Pattern of mainly tight coils, pattern size rounded between loose, scrunched, curved. The smaller the diameter, the tighter the curl, the larger the diameter the looser the curl. Make a brush stroke with chalk, do you see me in there? My density, how much I hide or show scalp could be sparse or dense; hair texture of fine, medium, or coarse; and feel…definitely not smooth. Surface texture is the feel of my outer cuticle layer. With a rougher surface texture, I will appear more matte or dull and with a smoother surface texture I will appear shiny.

***

Now, she is refreshed and she’s in a different stage of her ritual. The woman uses her Diversamé dryer, which can style me in a safe manner because it was made specifically for me which is rarely the case. I’m given the space to let the air go between the strands of my body. She is wearing sweatpants and a zip up sweatshirt; she brushes me up before braiding me down to keep me secure. She is moments away from going out.

We live in a Eurocentric focused society and still there is a community for me. For what I need there are places to go to seek that experience of possibilities that have stood years of time and practice. The intersection that are Hair /Beauty Supply stores, some aren’t owed by people that understand me, so I get excited when I see that it is Black-owned. A salon or beauty store acts as a conduit, a cultural staple, a place like Yerimah’s Sisters Beauty Supply provides for the woman in Pittsburgh. These locations exist for access, a cultural thing where she can walk in anyway at the very beginning of the process because there is a mutual understanding that connects me to my sisters and brothers.

Hair kinky, hair nappy, even that word packs a punch, hair curly, hair perfect. The zigzag of my pattern, I’m tied into a low bun. If I was down, I would not follow the movement of the wind. This is obvious as she steps off the bus in the Strip District. I am the hair that belongs to a woman. I contain her DNA, her background. She is exploring the locations that represent the history and transformation that is me and mine. I am going to be done, but am I not?

The versatility of me. Cornrows; braids; the quest for straight hair; faux locks; an afro, and natural curl. I remember mom doing hairstyles that would keep me healthy, I am a little intricate, she would tell the woman why her hair was special as the woman wondered why the process hurt.

On the other side another girl’s mother wants to make her life easier because she is busy or is aware of what the world is and she relaxes her little girl’s hair, unlike the woman, the girl has never seen her hair, only recognizes the “nappy.”

***

That girl somewhere in America sits between her mom’s legs, age 11 she doesn’t know what I look like, only that when she sees textured curls it’s time to straighten me up again. Every six to eight weeks it’s routine.

Just For Me boxes and empty Blue Magic bins

Her mom would put on the plastic gloves and begin the process. She parts her young daughter’s hair into four sections, then she mixes the relaxer and activator with the wooden spoon and applies the formulated substance to my roots. They used the supplies given except for the Vaseline, they were pros.

The young girl would sit, and it burned and itched, it burned her and me every single time, but she built a resistance, it was changing my body chemically.

My strands that grow naturally are different yes, but they are hair, nothing different from the next head and on but seen as uncontrollable in a place where control is sought after.

When she’s older her mom says she will take her to a hairdresser

She washes her daughter’s hair with the shampoo and conditioner from the kit, to apply the setting lotion after. They aim to prolong me being straight, that is what is praised, and it’s “not as hard to manage.”

***

A teenage girl in Nigeria sits in a plastic chair with the lights going in and out. Several aunties about 4 or 5 work on me, to braid in different colored tresses, wanting her to feel beautiful and excited about the versatility. There is another woman there; they read magazines, talk to each other, or watch what was is on the small television. In Nigeria, a teenage girl is getting her hair done, it’s not the salon America knows, it’s more of a space that grounds itself in minimalism, after some time one of the aunties would bring her food. The girl is nervous because she is without her mother, when the lights go out and it is dark, she must adjust and find strength.

The darkness of nighttime found in absence of light within Africa is different. A person and the night sky are forced to be comfortable with each other; but the teenage girl is comforted by the women that took the job of braiding me, they want her to feel safe and beautiful, as they build community around me.

***

You must understand my elasticity and tight coils cause me to have unique needs.

“It’s part and parcel of who you are and what you have to do,” says mom.

Dating back years, I’ve been styled and through that beauty has come through.

I don’t come with an instruction manual; Hair Story said out of Africa rose people in perfect harmony with their environment. I was made with intention, so much so my curves called the hands of the body they rested on. The hands and eyes learned by watching, the people learned by putting their natural combs through my strands. They accepted the challenge of who can find the paths that portray beauty, a message, a covering.

Two hands, four hands, six hands, no matter, I sit there as I am worked on, worked with. The way I can be sculpted can speak to those around me to follow suit out of awe. I am pretty.

Natural curl, or straightened strand:

• Buns in Zimbabwe or threading in Nigeria, they wrap me in yarn, yarn made from cotton. I am protected, resting and stretched. Grabbing a section of my body, the hands travel along the head to split me in organized sections, designing the skull. Twwwisstt.

In America, they don’t understand some aspects of that culture in me but there is knowledge here as well.

• Cornrows are different from the other kind of braids because the braid sits on top versus underneath. Separate my body into whatever sub section the parting needs to be, whatever direction one chooses to go, the direction of the style. Beginning the braid is usually from the front of the head to the rear. With three strands find the middle strand and take it, and either starting on the right or left side, take a strand of my body under the middle, alternating each side. Cornrows attach me to scalp
• For braids, grab my strands, left or right, go over the middle that is the way you get the braid to be underneath. I am intertwined, 3 sections, right to the middle, left to the middle, inside over inside over, all of this in a regular pattern. Are they adding hair extensions? People all over the world were trying the hairstyle out more stylistically in 1993–94–95, practical and chic they started calling me.
• For twists I am intertwined, 2 strands, round and round I go, a regular pattern.
• Weaves are a different kind of hair extension, pieces of synthetic or natural hair that are either clipped, sewn, or glued, into me. A leave out or fully closed; I am braided down and a piece is added on top of me.
• Afro. Braid me down or use a blow dryer to stretch me out, I can be big, but I certainly stand tall or wide as they pick me up and pick me up, a tool that starts at scalp and stretches me from the root’s outward. The bigger the better. To add more shape you can use water, hairspray, or just pat me. My natural tight-curl pattern is the highlight.
• Bantu knot, you start with whatever sub section of my body you would like. Create a base as if it is a two-stand twist but with one strand. Wrap me and continue to just wrap my body around your finger, circle it around until it begins to bend, and then bend it and continue around until it’s the end and tuck that last piece of hair under.
• Dreadlocks or the palm roll, apply whatever hair product, shea butter for example, a small amount. Apply it all over and take whatever a section of hair and you just smooth it between the palms, adding compression on it clipping it right into place at its base. I am knotted, intertwined together to create a permanent thicker bond

Curls braided, plated, done up, wrapped with hair fibers different to their own mixed together. In my curly body, because I can be fragile, more to work with you can say, I must be kept. Find a good way to keep me styled and protected, and like all, a routine upkeep stimulates new growth.

The doing and the undoing of me can be an individual experience, where you take time to be with your body and it’s extensions and you check in; but it can also be communal one where mother, sister, cousin, come and meet to talk, to learn about the culture; eight hours or three, figuring out how to wrap me, braid me, relaxing or conversing. Beauty, now in the 21st century we are speaking, products and trends, my body is a multidimensional structure with notable styles, textures, and adornments.

Community helps along with my journey, make me feel safe, there is nothing like it

***

We are back now, where the sign reads Yerimah’s Sister Beauty Supply Store. The woman goes in and as she opens the door, I feel the wind pushed towards me, I move but I move my own way. The woman walks past the aisles looking. She goes back and forth between making her own products and shopping for new ones. I look with her; I know what I like, and she is discovering. She is discovering with DIY movements, following hair gurus but there are pros and cons, I believe in paying homage to the people that have studied the art and science that is hair.

In this beauty supply store, there’s rows and rows leading to avenues of kinks, waves, braids, and straightened hair in various shades. You walk through the aisles of shades and see 1 black, 1B off black, 2 darkest brown, jumping to 220 mid blond, 613 platinum blonde, 27 strawberry blond and many more. The difference can be subtle but distinctive, even in my lineage this proves to be true. I naturally go around and up and curl, water shrinks me in size. I elongate on my own and I reject unhealthy heat. I am hair, by looking at me you are able to see what Bee Quammie calls “the nuance and plethora of our beauty”.

She passes the aisle of different hair products, the ranges of oils: jojoba, rosemary, chebe. She remembers boiling individual leaves and seeds to visualize the process of what she now sees on the shelf. The woman has picked this up from her mother. Amongst other things she is learning about me, to appreciate what I am.

***

I’ve been given a platform to be in sync with the head I grew from, and my “voice” comes in waves.

Hairstyles could stand for cultural signifiers, and I’ve been used as a window of survival, use me to speak when you can’t, although I am not the only thing that should define you.

Who resists me?

The woman walking into spaces meets colonized societies managed by time and white supremacy, ignorance, the racialization of beauty, these are all harmful ideologies simplified by the simple question.

“Can I touch your hair?” Followed by the remark… “your hair is…. interesting.”

There is lack of diversity in skill sets in salons, the woman has seen. There is texturism and colorism in her day to day, as well as the day to day of bodies that look like mine. Eurocentric standards, white spaces, they resist me just by discounting me for my body. There is discrimination, the difference in my texture affects him in his classroom, her in her job, them in their beauty. There is a forced dissonance, the unfair title placed upon me.

We don’t fault our ancestors who had to assimilate a certain way and that’s all they knew.

The frustration should be with the system and not the self, but we often turn inward and implode, triggered by trauma and unknowingness. The issue is the projection of the idea that whiteness and the proximity to it will always be the standard.

I have found myself in courtrooms, unable to speak to defend myself, but I stand on trial, I am effortlessly on the head but yet the topic of conversation. To exist for me is to acknowledge that when beautiful women wrap me up its for preservation, but it’s also fragments of the Tignon Laws, cover my natural body they would say in the past, and that has lived on and morphed into modern oppression of my structure.

You do not need to relax the tension that is my body to keep me in. I am on the head, I am a part of the body, but I don’t interfere with behavior or capacity, I just am, and you should let me be how the individual perceives, no questions asked no pressure applied.

***

Now she’s picked up some jojoba oil and makes her way to the counter, a quick decision for an edge control brush, oh how far we’ve come. As she walks, one part of her homemade concoction acquired, she thinks about me…

***

Versatility

I’m not always smooth to the touch. I’m natural they call it, but that’s not what I go by.

Similar story across the seas but individual when you get to the specific Black body. Hair like wool…where have I heard that before? The same place crowning glory originated from. I start wherever you want me to. I am in Africa Zimbabwe, not only there but across the continents — Caribbeans, Haiti, Americas, Pittsburgh. Middle passage taken across the Atlantic Ocean; time frames blurred family lines crossed though I am notable identifier of the diaspora.

Climates and weather, and types of water learn about me by learning what environment is around body as well.

There is not one single curl, Hair Story says my texture from western Africa alone ranges from the deep ebony, kinky curls of the Mandingoes to the loosely curled body of the Ashanti.

I represent the deep culture in individuals, favorable because I can be anything.

Self-appreciation, wear me as is, straighten my body so that I can be a mediator with the opposing force, speak for her in calmness; braid me and add other pieces to make me manageable, add them to the length of your desire; attach me to scalp, bring me closer to her in the cornrows, strands going left to right. I am the outward expression of a person after all.

Give yourself some grace, you are not supposed to be an expert right away, allow yourself the learning curve of discovering me. I am not hard to manage, I ask you when you say that, for whom?