Why Did I Cut My Hair? Do I Miss My Hair? And Other Questions I Seem to Answer Every Week

In my return to this blog, I have to clarify one thing that has been a matter of much inquiry amongst my peers over the last couple of months: the reason(s) I cut off my hair. Thus, let me start from the beginning.

When I first started growing my hair in the late summer of 2001, I didn't really have any intention to grow it for a long period. It was over the next few months that I started to fall in love with my hair. And it grew like a wild flower. I graduated college and law school with my afro fully intact. Over 8 years of college, law school and work, my hair had been puffed out, pulled back, braided up and loc'd in. However, when I started to loc my hair in the fall of 2008, I knew that I wasn't going to grow it for an extented period... maybe a couple months I thought. Again, my hair worked its charm on me and a couple months became more than a year. Furthermore, my hair was so throughly loc'd, there was no going back to my glowing "afro mane."

In the middle of 2009, I knew that I would cut off my hair, but I didn't know when. I also didn't tell anyone that I was going to cut off my hair because it was really no one else's business. So, several dates came across my mind - the first day of autumn, my birthday, New Years Day. However, none of those days seemed right because they were slightly over done. So a week into 2010, I figured out the date I would cut off my hair - it would be May 19th (Malcolm X's birthday). I chose that date because it was random enough that no one would make any weird conclusions about me cutting my hair because of my age or the New Year or my new firm etc. Instead, it would be about a new beginning... a new day... a new chapter. Most importantly, Malcolm's life and his autobiography have had such an influence on the adult I have become, and my "natural" was a part of the first chapter of my adulthood. So, it made some sense that the beginning of my next chapter would have something to do with him. Additionally, Malcolm X was very willing to accept change in his life. I want to be that brave.

When I decided that I would cut my hair, I knew I wanted to have a personal celebration. I had carried my hair proudly. It was never a burden and it was never heavy. I wanted to celebrate that. I wanted to celebrate that I had been uniquely myself and beautiful in my own way and on my own terms, despite those who may have wanted me to look a particular way that they could accept -friend, foe, and stranger alike. But I didn't get to that celebration because a "detour" took place in my life. That detour created some energy that I knew I had to get rid of or I would not be a happy person. Keeping my hair was not completely out of the question, but the way I felt just a few days before I cut off my hair in February, I knew I would just be a very angry person to a lot of people if I kept my hair, and I didn't want to feel that way. I knew I couldn't wait three months - waiting would just be for spite and stubbornness, not for happiness. Even with deciding to cut off my hair, I didn't know what I was going to do, meaning I didn't know if I was just going to go about living my life the way it was, or give everything up, pull a Lauryn Hill and go on the road with my guitar doing Hip Hop folk music.

I have not discussed too much of what happened during this "detour" and I don't plan on doing so until a later time in my life... when I write my own autobiography perhaps. Too many of my friends do not have enough degrees of separation from the situation for me to go telling everyone. It wouldn't heal anything. The one person I did tell everything to is my friend Renee in Toronto. Renee is one of those special people who have the ability to make you feel like she is hugging you through the phone. Maybe that's why she was the first person I thought about contacting... I just felt like she would understand. When she called me after I ranted to her on my Facebook e-mail about everything that happened and how I was feeling, her voice and her kind ear put me at ease. I knew I would be okay. She was what I refer to as "my safe person." Sometimes we all need a safe place to go to when we feel like the outside world is a little more dangerous than we want it to be. And then there are people we need at the right time to catch us when we think we're falling. I think I have a few "safe people" in my life, Renee was the right choice at that moment. A few days later, I cut it all off, but I stayed put and stood my ground.

Before the deed was done, my hair was feeling heavy. I knew I was ready to start anew. It wasn't very difficult because I had already thought out my hair cutting strategy before I even bought the clippers. I had my television volume up kind of loud because I didn't want to think about what I was doing too much; the quietness would have had me going through too many memories, good and bad. As I figured out my cut, I thought about the many beautiful women who had cut off their hair for whatever reason - India.Arie, Erykah Badu, Melissa Ethridge, Robin Roberts and the few women I personally knew who did the "big chop." I felt a kinship with them, cutting all of your hair off still isn't considered womanly by some, and having long hair isn't considered manly (particularly in the professional world) by others. After I was done, I was comfortable with what I saw in the mirror; this was always a big idea for me. If I could look at myself in the mirror and be happy and proud with what I saw, then I knew I made a good decision. And it was done and I put all of the pictures on Facebook.

There was no celebration, but there was a lot of reflection on everything in my life - my passions, my goals, and the people who are in my closest circles. I was forever changed that night. I'm still not sure how to articulate that, but I can feel it. I can feel it in just the way I'm dealing with people. I don't know if it's for the better. It is what it is.

I do miss my hair... a lot. I miss flinging it around when I got out of the shower or just finished washing it. I miss running my fingers through it and I miss it resting on the back of my neck. When I see other folks walking around with natural hair, I feel a little left out. I kind of feel like I'm no longer a member of the club - our little special club of "nappturally" beautiful people. I don't how long that feeling will be present, but it's still here. Also, I still feel a little awkward when people compliment me on my hair cut. It's like, you want to compliment me? NOW??? Of course, compliments are nice, but it feels weird to receive compliments after cutting my hair, like cutting off was a prerequisite for the good attention.

Finally, I wanted to write this blog to get some frustration off my chest. This year, I started a law firm with two other attorneys around the same time that I cut off my hair. Recently, a friend of mine, maybe in a joking manner, implied that I cut off my hair because I was starting a firm - this apparently would make me more appealing to potential clients or judges, I guess. I would have rather given up EVERYTHING than too cut my hair for THAT. When I graduated from law school, there were plenty of Black men who cut off their naturals. Some did it because they were just ready to. Others explicitly did it exclaiming, "I gotta get a job." I didn't do that. In fact, I carried my natural for four years and met with many more clients, other attorneys and judges than many of my "bald head" bredren did during the same period, and had no trouble with anyone. Let's be real, I'm a Black man in America, I'm not what many people want to see as a lawyer, doctor or business person - hair be damned. If someone had a problem, that's fine, but that's not my worry... My goal has always been to assert that even if you don't like me or the way I look, you are going to have to take notice of me, because I want to be that darn good. If I don't get there with someone and I've done my best, then it wasn't meant to be and I won't change who I am for approval of the closed-minded.

I have discovered that I really want to create some sort of support system or a movement for natural-haired Black professionals. I think it's needed. Back to the idea of a safe place, I didn't feel like I had a safe place among my fellow Black professionals all these years. Everyone is so geared into making Black professionals look like "the acceptable Negro," that there are few around to protect those who don't want to fit that mold. Hopefully, my journey will make it easier for someone to feel safe to break the mold and let their kinks glow.

Where Have all the Brown People Gone?

This past week saw the series finale of the award winning television show, "Ugly Betty." With the end of this series, there are currently no live action programs on broadcast TV with a majority non-white cast. I say "live action" because the Fox animated program, "The Cleveland Show" is now the only television show on a broadcast network with more brown faces than white ones. However, the show's creators, main writers, as well as the voice of the main character, are all white people.

[Photo: "Ugly Betty" Star, America Ferrera and series Executive producer, Salma Hayek.]

As a child of the 80's and 90's, I feel like I was spoiled by all the television shows that had majority Black cast members. From the legendary "The Cosby Show" to "A Different World," if you were young and Black in the 80's and 90's, you saw plenty of images of yourself (positive ones!) on tv without ever having to touch BET (Black Entertainment Television). Back in those days, there were actually Black people on NBC. I already mentioned "Cosby" and "A Different World," but there were also long-running series like "227," "Amen," and "The Fresh Prince of Bel Air" bringing in plenty of ratings for "the peacock network." And though there has been a little more "color" on NBC shows lately, as the 21st century was starting, much of the casts on NBC shows had very few non-white faces.

A few days ago, I was reminiscing about one of my favorite tv dramas during the 90's, "New York Undercover." This show was one-third of one of my favorite primetime lineups - every Thursday night on Fox, "Martin," "Living Single" and "New York Undercover." After I mentioned this on Facebook, I received several comments from my fellow FB'ers with the same fond memories. As I said then, Thursday night was my favorite night of the week because of these shows, particularly "New York Undercover." I have such great memories of those shows because they were so much a part of my teenage years. The characters were memorable and relatable, the writing was quality and the acting was good too.

Many shows with majority African American and/or Latino cast members have been very successful for many broadcast networks. In fact, networks like Fox, UPN, WB/CW, started their networks maximizing majority non-white tv shows, only to eliminate them once the network got its footing. We saw this recently with the CW cancelling shows like "Girlfriends," "Everybody Hates Chris" and "The Game" all within a year. Simultaneously, there has been so much energy dedicated by fans of "The Game" to bring the show back in some sort of format, even if on BET. I think this is because there are so few shows where non-white people can identify with the characters. "The Game" was a good show... I watched it. However, I have not seen this much fervor to bring a show back that, honestly, was fairly average. Granted, the plot lines were juicy and scandolous, but if there were other shows with comparable casting, I do not think folks would be as distraught of its cancellation.

I wonder if we have gotten so in love with the idea of "multicuturalism," that we think that diversity in Hollywood is acheived when we see a couple of non-white people in a show or movie. Yes, shows like "Grey's Anatomy," the CSI programs, "Heroes," "24" and "The Office," have very diverse casts. However, for every one of those shows, there are several shows with NO non-white characters. And for some reason we are supposed to be comfortable with that; having a majority Black cast or Latino cast in a couple of shows is apparently too much to ask for. In a country where there is a Black man as president with a Black family in the White House, where the majority of new births in America are Latino, we are supposed to be comfortable with numerous all-white casts on every broadcast network, with a few shows having a token brown face to "add some culture."

Well, here's to "The Cleveland Show"... I guess.