10 Ways to Combat Winter Hair Shedding Naturally

how very ironic that as i sit here pondering the dry-as-hay fro that's sitting atop my head i find this fabulous article from Savvy Brown on 10 Ways to Combat Winter Hair Shedding Naturally!

it's a necessary reminder that every part of your body, from the inside out, needs nourishment and when it is properly nourished it shows. now excuse me while i take this snow day to do some self-maintenance!

ps. your kid's hair and body need the same inside out care! don't take those beautiful, junior fros for granted ;-)

hairy situation

i spend way too much time talking about this natural, giant, curly mass of hair. i said 'too much time' because i'm not talking about my hair, i'm talking about my son's.

apparently my decision to just let it be big and beautiful as long as he lets me detangle and comb it a few times a week, doesn't sit well with everyone. there seems to be some unspoken rule that if a little black boy is going to have long hair it should be cornrowed or braided in some way. if not, cut it off.

i happen to think his hair is fantastic just the way it is and i have no desire to try and contain it. in fact, this one's for you kid!!

Whip My Hair Sesame Style - Willow Smith Remix (I Love My Hair)

perspective

your mindset shapes your life. it shapes how you see the world, it colors your opinions of situations and people, it determines whether you have good or bad experiences.

i was just reminded of a very short story that had a very big impact on me. in the 1920's a bunch of fellow writers challenged ernest hemingway to write an entire story in just six words. six words, and hemingway felt it was his best work. six words:

For Sale: baby shoes. Never worn.

i read that in high school, freshman year. i thought it was one of the saddest things i'd ever seen. it was so pointed, it felt like it had to be just six words because it was too tragic a story to relay anymore than six words. i thought it was a story of loss and suffering.

about a year ago i was asked if i'd ever heard the hemingway six-word story, to which i replied, "i've heard it but i don't remember the words. i do remember it's something ridiculously sad."

i googled and found:

For Sale: baby shoes. Never worn.

this time i was struck at how sweet and joyous the story was! this time it was a story of growth and surprises. it was funny and cute and i read it over and over, smiling the whole time. i wanted to remember it.

perspective.

the first time i read the story, i read it with the mind and experiences of a cynical teenager. i was rebellious and often jaded, i didn't see that the world had a lot to offer and most of what it did give was sorrow life was about loss so the story was about loss.

when i read it again as an adult, i read it with the mind of a woman content with herself and her world. i read it as a woman in love, a happy new mom, a confident woman. i read it as the mother of a healthy baby boy that just outgrew three pairs of shoes before he ever had a chance to wear them. this time, the story was beautifully triumphant.

perspective. everything i see is colored by my perspective, which means that living with a good perspective keeps my experiences wonderful and uplifting. i have wonderful experiences because i choose to see the wonder in my experiences.

it's all about your perspective.

michael jackson, chris brown & raising a man

I don't often write about pop culture goings on but i had to make an exception. I usually keep such opinions to myself because I don't tend to agree with the popular opinions, but I never cared about being popular so here goes.

Michael Jackson and Chris Brown have become sort of linked in my head in the past couple weeks and it's pissing me off. more accurately, people's response to them is pissing me off. I loved Mike's music, have since childhood, but dude had obviously lost a few cogs in his mental machinery and it showed. a great deal of that undoubtedly had to do with the fact that his life was never outside of the constant, harsh scrutiny of the American public. we treat our celebrities pretty bad, basically saying that because they have a talent that we (and our children) admire they must be beyond reproach. becoming known means losing the freedom to make mistakes and that's an impossible way to live.

those who survive the American scrutiny do so by living below the radar as much as possible, often at the risk of losing their celebrity status since we only pay real attention to the scandals and dirt. Mike was a constant blip on the radar and his sanity suffered for it.

but now that he's gone the outpouring of love and devotion for him is profound! aside from the passing, light-hearted jokes most seem to have forgotten that he MAY have possibly done some horrible things to hurt children. it may have all been a big scam to get money out of a celebrity, but it may have been true. either way it seems to have been largely forgiven by the public now that he's gone.

but Chris....geez!

this young man screwed up bad! even he admits that. he's living under the same over-demanding watchful eye of the American public and he really messed up. he allegedly beat his girlfriend (another celebrity!) and now he's become as hated as Bin Laden to some folks. what's worse, the man is trying to make some sort of public apology for his mistake and we're treating him as if he's a serial killer! I've seen blog posts that wished death on him! DEATH!!

and this is his first public screw up. he's barely had a chance to be an adult and have a career and we've decided he's garbage and should be discarded. damn.

now, in no way do I condone his actions. he beat a woman and should be punished for that harshly enough to let him know that it's a behavior that WILL NOT be tolerated. but do I think he should lose his life and livelihood for it? no!

I have a 1 year old son. I am already teaching him that if he does something wrong he should apologize. he should apologize to the person he wronged and anyone else who was affected by his actions. but now I feel like our culture is saying "if you do something wrong you can try to apologize but we ain't gonna believe you and we're gonna treat you like crap henceforth!" how is that a good lesson to teach?

so many women especially are tearing this man apart and so many of them are raising men! the torrent of female anger out there right now is blazing and it's sad. It's like we're all telling our sons that because they have penises by birthright they are never allowed to err or slip, especially not against a woman, if so they will be scorned and hated forever. that sucks!

I actually know at least three men who, in their raging, hormone laden youth, raised their hand and hit a woman. it was stupid, impulsive, violent behavior and it was a mistake. two of those men are now loving husbands and fathers who have never engaged in such violent behavior again (the third I lost touch with so I can't attest to his development). if those two men had to endure the scrutiny and judgment we're raining down on Chris Brown I doubt they'd be doing so well today.

what's hurts me more is that he's so young for us to decide he's finished! we're apparently more forgiving of older men and women and their screw ups than we are of our young men. former DC mayor Marion Barry was caught on tape smoking crack and having an affair and four years later the good folks if DC re-elected him; all's forgotten. let's not mention that he recently had a woman accuse him of stalking and now he's under investigation again! Bobby and Whitney were constantly in the news for domestic issues, but i guess we forgave them both because they forgave each other...?

but Lisa 'Left Eye' Lopez (who i also loved) fought with her man publicly and eventually burned down his house! eh, no biggie. what about the popular trend of destroying a man's car if he dares to wrong a woman? who cares, it's just a car, and we're women, we're allowed to be jerk, right?

Chris Brown is being more of a man than most and is not only making some sort of effort to apologize to the woman he wronged but to everyone who will listen. is he sincere, I have no idea, and neither do you. unless you're an expert in body language and lie detection, you have no clue as to his sincerity, just biased speculation. is he reading from a TelePrompTer on his video apology; I HOPE SO!! any intelligent individual with something important to say, that's going to be on the Internet for the world to see for decades to come, should write it down so that they are clear, articulate, and they can be sure their point gets across. Barack Obama reads from a TelePrompTer, George W. Bush did not. do you get it? does reading a speech make it less sincere than making it up as you go along? no, it just makes it clearer and lessens the chance of the person sounding like the bumbling idiot that George W. always sounded like.

slowly, over the course if 50 years, Michael Jackson lost himself and drowned in the shallow pool of the American eye, and now we're holding Chris Brown's head under water while he flails and gasps for air.

I'm at home still telling my son "say you're sorry for hitting your friend." what are you telling your sons?

shining contradiction

The passing confusion of a self-esteem built on a fading facade.