JANUARY

i cannot believe tomorrow will be week 4, yes week 4 since dee twisted my hair! they've lasted sooo long. i was hoping to colour for the new year, but my hair is still looking so good i can get at least another 2 weeks outta it!!

4 weeks and your scalp is cool? Cool. I did a serious hot oil treatment during the holidays. Did I tell ya? I used Sweet Almond oil, mixed with some oil of Myrrh, then sat under the dryer for about 20 minutes. Then shampooed and used a deep conditioner. My locs were soft and not dry at all! I'm now recommending a hot oil treatment at LEAST every 2 months!!!!

i've never hot oiled mine. why did you choose those oils? yes, surprisingly my scalp is just fine.

I wuz gonna use olive oil, then I remembered that I'd bought some sweet almond oil and the myrhh a while back, decided to mix them together and give it a go. I don't know that I will definately stick with the same oil combinations, but will definately do the hot oil thing regularly. The other thing is that I didn't retwist my locs afterwards....simply sat under the dryer until I got sick of sitting there. They came out great! Not as neat, but more organic like. I will not retwist every time now, just maybe every OTHER time I wash to keep them from growing together

oohhh i can't believe you're at that point where you can choose whether to retwist or not. does any scalp show?

yes, some still shows. Whats wierd about it is that my hair actually appears CURLIER (If that's possible) at the root, and I like it more. Also, I think the locs maybe softer because they are not as tight.

FEB 2002

had my first terrible experience. been eyeing this black and beautiful glossing gelee for a while says it gives you incredible shine from every angle and it was in this clear jar and the gelee was like an inviting irredescent pink. everything about this product appealed to me, it had been calling me for months. so after i bit (a very little bit) of hemming and hawing i took it up to the register with my $3.99 plus tax and raced home to wash and retwist using this wonderful new gelee, not gel mind you none of that common stuff for me...i'd graduated to using gelee. i washed and conditioned and sat in the living room with my clips a peice of bounty paper towel (for quick clean ups) and my clear jar of black and beautiful irredescent pink gelee that guarenteed incredible shine form every angle. humm kinda feels thick, all the better to hold you with, i thought. twisted , under the dryer for round half hour came out looked in the mirror, hair felt all...all..........stiff?, sticky?, gritty? and.....and it had this..............dull, grey film.....dust, stuff all over and the more i rubbed the more this dust appeared!! i kinda wet it and tied it and slept on it and in the morning it would be gone...right?...wrong!! it was worse!!! i had to shampoo TWICE and retwist.

two good things came outta this. 1) i've got retwisting down to an hour. 2) stick to my products i know and love..........for now........maybe!!

OHMIGOD!!!! Look at the ingredients in that thing. there's obviously something in it that produces the film and you wanna know what that is so you can avoid it in any of your future products you be tryin. I'm still thinking to stick to the natural products is our best bet. Sorry you had to go through the process again, but once you determine that your hair is jacked cause of the stuff you've used you ain't got no choice but to wash out real good and start the process over. Dag I haven't washed my hair yet. It's been about two weeks. I just got the mayonnaise 'cause it was there. I hope it don't make it too dang soft, which means I will have an out right AFRO at the root, and will be re-twisting all night when I finally get around to this chore.

I washed and re-twisted my locs Tuesday night, but this time, rather than finger twisting, I palm rolled my hair. When I finger twist, there is hardly ANY hair that falls out of my head, yet the palm rolling ended up with a host of little short hairs all over my shirt. You know what they look like, I don't really wanna say, but it's similar to the hair you see in the shower that you try to rinse down the drain with the shower head rather than come even CLOSE to touching it! The verdict is still out on the final results though. I'm not sure if they're any more uniform or not. All I know is that I also slept with the dryer on my head?.you know, it's got one of those soft plastic caps so you can sleep while you dry your hair. It apparently scrunched up the back so that when I took the clips and stuff out, I looked like I'd just had a hair cut. All the locs at the back were kind of curled under and looking like a locked bob.

MARCH

I just wanted to share something with you guys:

Last night I went to this panel discussion on Black women in corporate America down in Harlem. Let me tell ya, there were hardly ANY locs in the crew. There were a couple of TWA's. There were at least 200 women, but as far as the sisters under lock-down, it was me, and perhaps 2 others at most.

What I decided was that black women in corporate America are still rather hesitant to rock the boat and show any defiance by locking their hair. Locked hair is probably seen as sealing one's fate to a lower level in the corporate wokplace. BUT, I then went to this little restaurant on Lenox ave. So tiny, could only seat about 20 people tops. Here's the breakdown: Two brotha's having dinner at one table; a nice couple sitting next to us, the sista had the hugest afro-puff you ever DID see! VERY cute on her! Then, another couple came in, the sistah with locs down past her shoulders. Locs all OVAH Harlem!

After sitting through that panel discussion, I realized that these women weren't really sharing anything that I didn't already know, but the thing was how totally uninterested I was in even ATTEMPTING to join in their ranks! (I'd take their salaries, though!).

I've decided that the funky, creative, locked types are more me!

i have a confession to make.

i had planned to cut my locs on july 28th after one year. reason, i wanted all my own natural hair colour, i wanted to start them thicker and with 2 strand twists. however, after returning from ny on sunday and seeing a sister with hair colour like mine down her back beautiful under a scarf, i was like you know, i have not even given mine a chance yet, and they do change almost on a daily basis, ima give them a chance. they do say most people if they do cut their locs will do it around year 2 cause that's when you get a good idea of how they will look.

I kind of like being a defiant one, even if it's quietly done with a simple change in hairstyle and focus. So many friends I have say that they will start locs when they make a certain amount of money, in other words, when they can finally tell the corporate world to kiss off. But I think life is too short. When I see perms, I so rarely see ones that don't remind me of fried out, dried out, jacked up hair, that I know I'd never, NEVER return to those days. I think my nappy hair goes better with my brown skin and my broad nose! It's a total package! I also think, though, that some of these women that say they would only if they thought their corporate environment would accept it are using that as an excuse.

Face it, not everyone is strong enough to cut off a bunch of hair, and sport little twists, take the stares and STILL keep their heads held high.

MAY

remember yesterday when I said I thought my locs were cute when I left the house in the morning but they'd undergone some sort of ugly transformation while sitting in traffic on the way to work? Well, yesterday evening, I'm sitting at this resturarant with this guy in SoNo, and this little girl (about 8 maybe) runs up to the table, frightens me actually, and says something in what was either Spanish or Italian. she was looking at me all intense and stuff, and I really got the icky feeling that she was about to touch my hair. (Really dont like for people to put their hands in my hair unless we know each other real well!) Because I didn't know what she said, she frightened me, as I was remembering that movie The Sixth Sense that I watched the other night. This old man, apparently her grandfather, then comes up to us, hugs the little girl and says 'She says you have beautiful hair.' This was NOT a little sistah, who've I've gotten the compliment from before. Her grandfather was probably a bit baffled as to what she saw, but he then said to my date (who has an ever increasing bald spot) that ANY hair on HIS head is beautiful! I just thanked the little girl and felt a little more special, if only for the moment. So, even though the love/hate thing will continue, and there may even be those to tell you locs are unattractive, out of the blue, someone will remind you of the beauty that shows from them.

I actually get picked up by the airport shuttle at some absolutely unGODLY hour on Friday morning - 5:45 to be exact! I shampooed, hot oiled, AND conditioned Sunday. It really looks good still. I think it was the hot oil, then sat under the dryer so it got pretty well distributed, but my hair is rather smooth, like you can actually pull your fingers through most of it. Not frizzy at all. Thursday night I'm thinking about re-twisting around the front just to make it neat. So you've got enough for a pony tail already?!!!! That's quick! You know, Memorial Weekend is my 2 year anniversary! I'm going to experiment with color real slightly this summer. When I was in college, I used to lighten my hair with lemon juice. I'm going to start using it in places right before I head outside for my walks or to play tennis and see what develops. Right now, I've still got that so dark brown it's almost black hair going that I have every winter. But, the lighter color that I used to experience during the summers may have actually been due to the relaxer stripping color from my hair, I dunno. Either way, I'm going to try some lemon juice for a while to see what hapens.

JUNE

we have not talked about hair / diet lately. bad sign, very bad sign (on my part anyhows). my hair is still black needs washing this weekend (maybe tonite).

AUGUST

I was up at this concert in New Haven Saturday, and There was this one sister that had locs so pretty I coulda screamed! She was rockin' them too along with this nice dress and heels. I hated her for a minute! Other than that, lots of shelacked hair styles and bad perms! I even saw a guy in a pin striped zoot suit! Go figure!

who was in concert? how long were her locs? coloured? sharon saw some pretty red ones so now she's talking bout colouring hers. the colour rinse i had put on is all outta mine now. and even the colour from the hair show in march is all faded. i'm not gonna touch it (colour wise) til b4 canada august 2nd. still got half a bottle of black, half a bottle of sunset (used on my daughter) and a little wine (used on my other daughter and mine). do i wanna go to canada with reg locs and blend into the crowd, or wildly exiting orangeish reddish locs and really wow these west indian party goers (got carried away there with the exitement)

Her locs were just grazing her shoulders...they were very uniform in diameter - appeared to be a bit more narrow than mine. Maybe a bit closer to yours...her hair was very dark, but looked as though color had been applied at some point because I saw some slight golden tips. Very cute. You SHOULD do something for Sharon here, just in case she's got friends that would like to do something that cannot afford a Jamaican trip. As far as you coloring yours, I really thought the color from the fashion show was nice on you. I like the way your locs are looking now, but for some reason, I like more golden highlights than reddish ones....can't figure out why?

hey, you know, that's not a bad idea!! and i'm supposed to be maid of honor!!! we all fly out on the 26th nov. maybe i could plan something the weekend of the 23rd or the 16th? will you be in town? you're right. a home wedding shower is definately in order. can't wait for mine to graze my shoulders. the 28th will be a year and yours were so much longer at a year than mine. thought i'd be ponytailing it by now. when you gonna get the lemon juice out?

Dang! Thanks for reminding me of the lemon...too bad 'cause I'm playing tennis this evening, and all that sunlight would be alright if I had lemon on me now! You know you can't really compare locs on different heads - my hair is really deceptively thick...couldn't really tell as long as I was getting the life relaxed outta it! Just like I'd love to see them on my younger sister, who has a thicker head of hair than mine! She's so hated dealing with it that ever since she's had a part time job, she's paid someone else to deal with the drama weekly! Now, I think your locs look adorable on you, but like I said, I think I like the idea of golden highlites better than the red, but I know you like red. Maybe instead of the whole head, you can pick individual locs, to somewhat STREAK....hmmm

Aw, damn! I just came back first visit to the ladies room since I got here (around 7), and noticed this STUFF on my right temple. I started rubbing it to get it off, and it got whiter and was a consistency like rubber cement. This morning before leaving, I'd actually used this Paul Mitchell Gel on my edges because they were looking a bit raggedy. So, once I finished cleaning off the right side, I started heavily scrutinizing the left side, and as I rubbed, it turned gluey and white. What a friggin' mess! Walking around here with basically GLUE in my head, all ovah my face! I guess that mess is going in the trash!

I did SOME work over the weekend! I tackled one of several totally disorganized closets that exist in my house. Actually now, it is the only one that ISNT disorganized. It's actually a pleasure to open up ther door (Yep! A sistah needs to get a life if she's getting pleasure from neatly organized closets!!!!) But now I can find stuff in it, and when I go to get something, everything else isn't falling out of the dern thing. Other than that, nothing else - added more spray paint to my head, but what I noticed, is that you cannot then run your hands through the locs without fading the color out and leaving some of the residue on your hands. Now, because it's shampoo out, I'm somewhat frightened, as it's supposed to rain this afternoon. If my head gets wet, my white linen top's gonna be gold and bronze around the shoulders! Now, I have the same fear as I had when I wore a relaxer and it rained!!!!!!!! Maybe spray in color isn't a good idea after all!

SEPTEMBER

I actually got brave, went to Sally’s and bought some semi-permanent color (medium brown), shampooed, colored (wished someone had’a reminded me to use plastic gloves….nails STILL look dirty!), then conditioned and retwisted up. After drying over night, I unwrapped, unclipped and looked in the mirror at a head of locs that are just as dark as they’ve always been! I wanted to go a bit lighter, but was scared, and this looked lighter than mine, so I just KNEW I’d see some kind of lighter brown highlight or SOMETHING, but no matter what angle, whether in the bathroom, in the dressing room of Macy’s under the glare of fluorescents, or sunlight, my hair is STILL it’s everyday dark, deep brown color. What a disappointment. The good news is this stuff was supposedly so gentle that you can use it immediately after relaxing, so I may get braver still and try again next week with a seriously lighter color…

most semiperms never worked on my hair i always wanted brighter. the ONLY one that has been working and i even put it on both my daughters is avatar by colourworks. can't find it online though. but it comes in like 10 shades for 2.99. i'm spose to buy a bottle of the red wine for the woman here at work who has locs (9 months worth)

What do you think of a clarifying shampoo? I'm considering trying one to try to get some of the residual product out of my locs, or is it a waste of time? Also, REAL tempted to go for some color - the kind you shampoo out but not this spray in kind. Was your hair real dry afterwards?

i almost always use the aussie citrifying shampoo and so does sharon. LOVE IT!! on monday i went to pennys and bought some keracare for a break. sharon had told me a friend of hers used the humetrus (or something) i used the detangling shampoo and extra moisture conditioner and my hair is sooo soft casue the woman had said it made her locs all bouncy and fluffy. i liked the results. the color i use i like also. and it does not dry out my hair.

2003