My Brown Baby by Denene Millner

Author:Denene Millner
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Denene Millner Books/Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Published: 2020-05-05T00:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 38 A Teen Struggles to Rock Her Locs Proudly, Courageously

I WENT #TEAMNATURAL with a very specific intention: to show and prove to my daughter, Mari, that she should be proud of her hair exactly how it grows out of her head. And for more than 14 years, I’ve lovingly tended to every curl, kink, and tendril on her scalp, speaking power and strength into them and her, with a mother’s hope that by modeling, praising, and encouraging her natural journey, she would be all good. That each of these things would be enough.

I underestimated, though, the power of other—other images of black women in the spotlight, rocking weaves like it’s some kind of superpower, other thoughts in her head about what it means to be a 14-year-old African American girl with locs among a cadre of friends with relaxed, straight hair, and boys other than her daddy and her brother, who have their own warped ideas of what constitutes beauty. And I found out only recently and quite by surprise that the girl just isn’t feeling her natural hair. Not like I’d hoped she would.

In other words, when it comes to rocking her natural hair with confidence, she struggles. And because she struggles, I struggle, too.

Recently, I found this poem among the many poems and personal essays she penned for school last year. It is called, “My Hair,” and in it, Mari is curious, defiant, fierce. Vulnerable. Her piece led us to a new conversation about our natural hair, one that is decidedly deeper than the many we’ve had up until now. More grown up.

I am grateful for the conversation.

And scared to death of it.

Mari gave me permission to share her poem with the MyBrownBaby readers. I hope you see the beauty in her words and that they, too, give you fuel for conversations about hair in your own homes with your own children.

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