Random Hair Thoughts

So I opened up blogger, was ready to type and forgot what I wanted to say so I logged off until it popped back in there right quick.  I know this is likely just a by product of doing something new but I am starting to notice a lot more people with locs.  On one hand that's cause the semester just started and we just made a dramatic uptick in young black men on campus about half of whom are loc'd that I've seen.  But even not on campus I'm noticing hairstyles, people, options and the like all related to hair.  I know that's not unique to hair.  Whenever I buy a new car I suddenly notice all the similar cars on the road or in the parking lot or what have you.  There's no one just starting them right now but they are a mix of hues, lengths, sizes and styles and I'm here for it.  I finally got pinterest to stop showing me photos of white girls with locs and as soon as I did I stumbled on a board someone named Nigel Montcrief has assembled with a whole bunch of gray locs.  I'm enjoying that because my locs are salt and pepper so it's nice to see all of these young and old gray loc'd women.  And more than just sisterlocks because that's what I was finding when I searched before.  Nothing wrong with sisterlocks but my patience and my pockets are not set up for them. 

As I am looking at the photos and looking at my own hair something came to me tonight.  I hadn't actually thought about what my hair will look like in like five years.  I was thinking a year from now they'll be a decent length and looking more substantial.  Maybe they'd be chin and shoulder length depending on their location on my head and if so all the better.  But I really hadn't gotten past a year of hair growth in my mind.  I'm looking at locs of varying lengths but when I got past bra strap ones my brain was like damn that will happen if you don't trim them ever.  They just keep growing and getting longer provided you take care of them.  Ha.  Not sure why that surprised me or made me momentarily shocked because my hair has grown quite a bit since I chopped it off that not too long ago February.  But because of the texture the only way it was going to be down my back was if I flat ironed it for a length check or put it in some sort of braid or twist style.  My hair would defy gravity not swing lol.  Permanent length on my hair just threw me for a loop for some reason.  All in all I'm just enjoying myself and my hair and observing folks with hair I would call hair goals. 

One Month In

There will be photos.  I was going to do before and after appointment shots but the way my lazy was setup that didn't happen.  I had a meeting before my loc session and yeah when I got out of the car I was just glad to be out of the car.  Everything started on time and I was happy that she thought the locs looked good.  The back row was redone and is chilling on my neck.  Correction the row above that is chilling on my neck.  The middle of that row is minding its business.  The edges are on my neck and feeling more solid than they do when I redo them but got confirmation from the person doing my hair that it was normal for that row to just be a pain.  Based on how they looked today she said that I should be loc'd in a year.  Yeah but letting my hair just do its thing is been oddly liberating even when it wasn't quite doing what I wanted it to do.  And because I haven't been doing anything to it besides oiling my scalp and moisturizing the length of my hair the shorter bits are growing out and I'm pretty happy.

I do need to be fired as my own photog but here's two new photos.  I may tonight or later this week do a side by side from a month ago to today but this is what you got for now. 

I'm happy with the size, the flow of my hair and that it doesn't feel like my hair is somehow unkempt.  The only thing I have decided to do is make sure that my hair is tied down.  The first week I just put on my bonnet and went to bed and I think that led to some of the initial fuzziness.  I was a little worried that it was flattening them out too much but apparently not.  I did grab some caps that are allegedly specifically for loc'd hair so I may just switch to that for the next few days to see how I like them or don't.  Right now I think it's fine because most of my hair is still short enough that it wouldn't matter what was covering my head as long as something was.  Six months from now that may not be an option.  I also thought about an easier way to get oil onto my scalp primarily and remembered I had a bottle for that purpose that I hadn't been using.  I'm going to whip something up and take it from there.  That's it for now.

No Photo Just Updates

Hey All,

I meant to update last week but I had to go to a conference.  I may write about that in this post but this is mostly an update about the process thus far.  So I'm three days away from being three weeks into this process.  I'm scheduled for my first retwist next week at the four week mark.  I may shorten that for the second retwist but I have a plan for all of this which of course you know nothing about.  So what has changed in the nearly three weeks?  Not much.  The nape of my neck is on its own plan so I'll have to talk with her about how to maintain that between sessions.  The center/crown area of my hair seems to have maintained the best.  That's where my hair is thicker and a bit coarser especially compared to the nape area.  The sides aren't too bad but since that's where the limited friction would be when I sleep they aren't as tight at my root as the crown.  The very front where the gray is in total control is probably the loosest area compared to the rest.  That's also the result of some hair breakage from previous braiding expeditions but nothing is totally undone there just needs more attention at retwist.  And the other area of breakage that is actually hidden quite well by all these twists is the least uniform but it was also the shortest hair so again that was not a surprise as I have watched a lot of videos and hair less than three inches takes a lot to hold the starter locs unless you interloc which I am not planning on doing right now. 

One week in

This has been the longest week ever and not just because I have to make myself stop touching my hair.  It's the week of the summer intensive program and it has been plagued with rain so to make sure my hair didn't get wet I kept it under a head wrap the last four days.  I probably didn't need it today but I wasn't feeling fluffing out my hair.  I'm going to need to come up with a back up plan for the coils around the nape of my neck cause they are not about that life right now.  I fixed one and it was like good looking out.  The rest are slipping--which I have heard is normal but still--along the hairline.  There are only a few though so all things considered my hair is holding up relatively well.  You can't really see the parts at this stage and I'm ok with that.  My scalp was feeling hella exposed for the first few days.  The longer starter locs feel pretty solid and like they are going to chill into their next evolution.  The shorter ones are about 50/50 and then there's the aforementioned nape hair. 

My scalp isn't as itchy now either.  If I don't think about itchy scalp it tends to not flare up.  Even when I do it's something that can usually be resolved with a spot scratch here and there.  I'm going to try to stay up on documenting this process even if I don't post about it weekly I'll try to take photos.  For one thing I'm curious about how this will look over time.  But honestly I wanna be more mindful about my hair while I technically do less to it.  A few days ago I had a dream that I woke up and just combed it all out but I don't have plans to do that.  For now I just wanna keep it looking and feeling healthy for the next few weeks.  Retwist is already scheduled for three weeks from now but got an out of town trip that may push it up a week if I don't like how my hair is feeling when I get back.  I'm not sure why that would bother me really cause I'm not going to do much besides be somewhere with a completely different climate for this time of year. 

Here are the one week photos