Lifetime of Hair

Introducing: Christine Collymore, who is a single parent bringing up two children (son and daughter), living in a diverse town, loving writing, music and art. Christine's career is working with people and she is involved with community voluntary organisations as a volunteer. Christine wants to continue with creative writing, and finding peace and love.

Lifetime of Hair:

Part One

As a child, my hair was mine but not under my control. I have pictures of me with an inch of afro, then hair straight with big ribbons. As long as I can remember, my hair has always been short, thick, and kinky. ‘The hair hard’; ‘Why you don’t have pretty hair’; ‘Oh gosh, you break another comb’, were phrases that were trotted out every now and then.

There were no positive comments, considering it was supposed to be my crowning glory. So I always saw my hair as a problem, something that had to be ‘managed’. And managed it was, by the use of the hot comb. Then my hair became longer, less coarse and easy to put into a ponytail. I could have hairstyles like my school friends…

Part Two

…Now I have control of my hair and mind. And, yes, I went through the journey of continuing to ‘manage’ my hair with the use of chemicals, relaxers and curly perms. At the time, it didn’t matter about the damage I was doing to my scalp’; after all, ‘no beauty without pain’. The phrases of ‘nappy hair’, ‘It is a pity that you don’t have good hair’, still haunt and anger me.

I have learnt that I can undo the socialisation, which has affected my attitude and thoughts about my natural hair. I have experimented with twists, cornrow and my favourite, my afro. It is my crowning glory and I feel that I no longer have to look European to be proud of myself.

In fact, I feel like a beautiful black woman of African and Caribbean descent living in England. What I love about my hair is the ability to be creative and be individual. What is it about the desire to touch an afro, got one message for you, look but don’t touch?

I would consider locs, but I think that will be a story for part three...