Museum of Death - This is basically my ideal day out. The struggle continues, but I’ve finally learned to embrace my afro hair, and that’s a gift I wish for all black and mulatto children and adults still struggling to find the products that work for them. Although it’s been a lifelong struggle and continues to be one, my hair has made me more conscious of advertisements, and has caused me to form strong bonds with other women of my race and hair type. But the other day I was putting the Shea Moisture Curl Enhancing Smoothie into my hair and running my fingers through it, and it was the first time that I was proud of my hair. Media influences and many of the people surrounding me are still mostly white, so I’m routinely bombarded with pressures to make my hair as long, as thin and as silky as the women I see on Netflix or YouTube. It is incredibly thick, which I love, it is softer than any fabric a blanket can be made from, and it is stronger than I could have ever hoped it would be. My hair is much longer than it has ever been, though it still does not pass my shoulders. Since then, the bookstore has expanded the display and has added many more products and brands for us to purchase, and my hair has never looked and felt better. Rosalynne Whitaker-Heck who initiated the process of getting these products in the bookstore. Here was finally a place in Vermont I could purchase products that would make my hair thick, strong, soft and long - everything I’d always wanted my hair to be but could never achieve. When this display was put in, I was extremely happy, and so was every black and mulatto person I talked to about the display at my school. One side of the cosmetics display would have the products that I was so used to putting in my hair, and another section would have products that would actually help my hair. She also informed me that our college’s bookstore was bringing in an entire section that was dedicated to people with hair like ours. She directed me toward the brands I’ve discussed above. After her outburst of giggles subsided she explained to me how Suave takes out moisture and our hair needs to keep it in. She asked me what products I used, and at the time I was using Suave. One of the first things we talked about - as is normal for most black and mulatto women - was our hair. Amber eventually discovered such products as Shea Moisture and the ORS Olive Oil lines that are marketed for black and mulatto individuals to maintain our hairstyles, whether that be afro, weave, or any other hairstyle black men and women choose to rock.Īmber and I met in January 2016. While products such as Suave and Garnier are usually intended to get rid of moisture, which is a common problem I hear my white friends discussing, people with afros are supposed to lock in moisture because our hair naturally lacks it. But somewhere along the way, she learned that she had been doing all the wrong things to her hair. Growing up, Amber endured the same struggle I did.
#License key for itools 4 without paying 2019 how to#
And because her mother is white, she knew about as much about how to take care of Amber’s hair as my mother knew how to take care of mine. She grew up relying on her mother to teach her how to take care of her hair. Amber is half-black and half-white like myself, although her parents are the reverse race to mine, so her mother is white and her father is black. And she grew up with parents that also didn’t know how to take care of their hair. Though she had grown up in a different generation, my mom’s media influences were the same as mine. While my hair had come a long way from the tabletop style of my elementary days, my hair was still crunchy, short and falling out because she didn’t know how to take care of her own afro. I’ve lived with my mother - who is black - since I was 13. From what I remember, the people in the media that did have afros were black but were usually shown as destitute, ratchet antagonists to the protagonist with flowing, magnificent locks.īut whether or not people of my race - mulatto - had afros in the few times they were shown in the media, I learned everything I once knew about taking care of my hair from my mother. Whether it was blonde, black, brown or red, all of my media influences had silky hair that most often flowed to a long, breezy length, a length that my hair has never achieved without extensions. There are more white people represented in the media than black people, especially black people with afros. While there were not many people around me with afros outside of my family, there were even less people with afros in the television shows and movies I turned to for entertainment.