I Love My Black-A** Hair

Earlier this year, I wrote about the moment I realized I fell into hair complacency and the subsequent paranoia of ethnic hairstyles being "too black" for corporate . Despite having a very serious internal dialogue about how my talent, experience and interviewing skills should be the only factors that lead to my employment, I still worried about how potential interviewers would perceive me. I got microbraids for about a month in January (while I was still gainfully employed) and it was fine. I went back to my regular hair and then, I lost my job.

Oh no! What did that mean for the future of my tresses? At that point in time I couldn't fix myself to care any less because I was headed to Croatia to do baller things and swim in the Adriatic Sea. I got micros again -- and I found a better stylist to do it. And baybay, lemme tell you... I got my whole entire life with those micros. I even interviewed for, and landed a job. They were shoulder-length, with soft curls at the edges. The look was very soft and romantic. I wasn't worried about looking "too black," I just couldn't get over my hair being "too pretty." I kept those braids in for about two months and in that time I concluded that I no longer wanted to do my hair daily. I deferred to my two homegirls who are the queens of crochet braids. My bestie's fianc always has a bomb crochet 'do so I settled on a style and headed across town to meet the stylist.

Full disclosure, I hated the hair I chose for my first crochet job. I looked like a black cherub doll with 5.5 packs of "candy curl" in my head. So, I decided to take the hair out (I kept the cornrows), and follow the Marley hair trend. It being my first attempt at "crocheting" hair at all, the installation process took me a few hours... and almost three packs of hair. I was a lioness , baby. Chaka Kahn in her prime. I had a 4/30 batch of Lord & Cliff Hip Hop Braid and it was going down. I knew I was doing corkscrews the following day, but I decided to let the fro fly as I went to celebrate my homeboy's birthday at my favorite bar. I walked in the door and the alarms rang -- metaphorically speaking, of course. Everyone, I mean everyone was in love with my wild, massive hair. I couldn't believe it.

I went ahead and did the corkscrews (with the perm rods & hot water) the next day and they looked cute, but I didn't feel as edgy as I did with the big hair. I was already situated in my job (at a community college, btw) so I said why not, and decided to go full Marley hair... at work! My girl suggested I bring it down to 1.5 packs of hair. Oh, and I also migrated to the 4/27 blend to give me some good brown & gold contrast. This is the "blackest" my hair has ever been, in my life and I freaking love it. So do the boys. I promise I've been hit on more in the past 30 days than I have been in three months. Advantage, me.

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Quia Querisma is the globetrotting, techie-fashionista who writes about travel, style, and sometimes cocktails at MyJetSetStyle.com .