Hair Blues and Hair Dues: Memoirs of a Nappy Head

By Kacee Kemiah

Using the pen name, Kacee Kemiah, Kim Braxton expresses the trials and tribulations she endured from the moment she chops off her ponytails at the age of seven. "My hair never forgave me", she explained as she takes the reader through a journey of her hair experiences. Kim explains moving to another state as a child, being bullied in school and t

• Language: English
• Publisher: ShaBazz Enterprise Publishing
• Release date: Nov 1, 2022
• ISBN: 9781088029114

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                                                                 Written by Marla Stewart

I haven’t known Kacee Kemiah for too long.  I was only introduced to her two years ago. However, the name of the person I am about to tell you about doesn’t matter; she is one and the same.

I knew her as a child and to be honest, I worried about her a lot during her growing up years. I called her Kim as she was growing up, so, if you don’t mind, let me talk to you about Kim Braxton.

As she has noted in her book, she was somewhat clumsy. She broke both of her arms and her right leg. She was an oddball. She danced to her own drum beat. She would rather stay inside reading than go outside and play with the other children. To punish her, I would make her go outside. Even then she would sit by my door in our apartment hallway. Her style of dressing was definitely her own. I recall many times when I had to make her change clothes. Stripes and prints don’t go together, I would tell her, and she would ask me Why not?.  One day I saw her walking to the door like a zombie holding her arm very close to her coat. I asked her what the problem was, and she said, Nothing, only for me to find out that her brand new coat had been torn in the seam from under the arm to the waist area.  She had ripped it and was ashamed to tell me.  That was my Kim growing up.

I would love to say that Kim grew out of some of these traits; but I would be wrong. Even though there were other writers in the family, my sister Afi as well as me, her mother, I do believe the time she spent reading books was her inspiration for writing.   I wasn’t aware that she had been writing over the years. However, when I began to read some of her writings I was amazed, as I am sure you will be also. I laughed, I cried, I even said No she didn’t when I read about the pony tail being cut off, and I was there when it happened. 

Kacee Kemiah takes you on a wonderful journey with her. Her honesty is eye opening. Her adventures as a teenager on into adulthood will have you laughing and crying at the same time.  This book is so amazing that before you even finish, you will be looking forward to the next one.

Explanation of the Side Bar

As you begin to read my memoirs, you will find that I write the way I think and a lot of that has not changed over the years. My mind flows in a million directions at once; therefore, I have to stop and let you know where my mind has gone in the midst of a story or at the end of one.  Thus, the Side Bar: it was created to legally let my readers digress right along with me and allow me to add superfluous information that I felt I wanted to share.  Please don’t judge me for my style of writing!

Side Bar: Although Side Bar is a legal definition that is used in the courtroom when attorneys have a private conversation off the record, Side Bar for me was a saying that an old gangsta friend of mine would use in code if he wanted to talk in private. All he had to do was walk by and whisper in my ear Side Bar and I knew it was time, hopefully, for a good private conversation. So, I thank you all for joining me in my Side Bar thoughts and RIP Isaiah Ike Jones (Insane) for giving me something to remember you by, always.

1

Hair Dues and Hair Blues Memoirs of a Nappy Head

I sit here contemplating, wondering and asking myself, why? Why? Why did I decide to go natural?  Was I tired of the hair abuse, sitting in chairs for hours and hours at a time, only to be tortured endlessly?  Did I go natural because it was becoming popular? Did I go natural because I thought managing my own hair would be easier? Did I go natural to learn to experience my cultural roots and learn to love my own nappy hair? Did I go natural because I thought it would be cheaper than the thousands of dollars I’ve spent on weaves, wigs, ponytails, flat irons, braids? Yes, no, yes, yes, yes. In that order.   I have paid plenty of hair dues for my hair dos, pun totally intended.

Another factor I had to consider in going natural was that men respond completely differently to women with natural hair. Not always in a favorable manner.  At this point, I had no proof, but only to rely on the natural hair sistas.   Some had given me the lowdown on their experiences with men since going natural. Seems as if men are addicted and attracted to the weave just as much as we women are. Some, I heard, won't even make eye-contact or give a second look. I heard that some men believe that natural hair sistas are unattractive, militant, harsh, too outspoken, man-haters and difficult to deal with.

         They seem to equate natural hair with being aggressive and difficult to deal with.  I’m certainly militant and difficult to deal with, but it has absolutely nothing to do with my hair. Then I had some good news from a good sista/friend. She told me that she has never had any problems with the opposite sex and men are all over her all the time.  I believe her as I have witnessed it first hand, but hell, she is completely bald. GIRL BYE.

I had another friend tell me that I will not attract men any less than I ever had but that I would attract a different type of man. I pondered that briefly….My next thought was good because I haven’t been very lucky with the riff-raff I have been attracting. My second thought was perhaps I’ll attract a good looking tall one with dreadlocks and good teeth.  I must admit there has been a time or two that I have gotten that nod of appreciation from a brother and a verbal I see you sista, I like what you’re doing there.

In moving forward, I just apply my new mantra, Less is More to men as well as my other Less is More philosophies that I have embarked upon. However, I am not giving up on the thought that there might be a deep conscious brother out there waiting for my good nappy.  Men and hair are a whole other story. Hmmmm, I think I may write about that later. Anyway, I would not let that be a deterrent in my decision.  I’m gearing up, I’m going all natural. I’m fired up; I’m excited and ready to roll.

As I reminisced through my initial thoughts I questioned myself, did I understand how difficult it would be?  Absolutely not! Did I think that it would be this hard?  Nope. Did I know there would be consequences and repercussions such as hair loss? What the heck, how did that Happen? Future Unanswered questions.  Why do I have a handful of beautiful curls in my hand? And why don’t the curls in my hand look like the naps in my hair? Wait…What happened? What’s going on?

With the support of some of my favorite blogs, my own research and my natural hair friends and acquaintances, I feel equipped and encouraged to proceed with gusto. Additionally, my oldest daughter, Charity, decided to go natural a few days later because she was just as tired of HAIR BLUES and HAIR DOOS as I was.  Only thing is, my daughter has amazing hair or what uppity Negroes call GOOD HAIR.  FYI, she didn’t get it from me.  Her hair challenges were not my hair challenges. She wears all sorts of cute short trendy styles and her husband is a barber to boot. HMMM, no hair sympathy for her, none. She is naturally and totally fabulous.  She is what I refer to as a Bad Hair perpetrator. She cuts, colors and styles with no apparent damage to her hair. She looks great with minimal effort so to her I say, GIRL BYE.

Ironically, my middle child is 100% loyal to the soil and didn't flinch when she was not having any parts of it. She was like Good luck with that, I’m not doing that. No Thank you Mama. She had a look of horror as if I had offered her rat poison.  To this day, La’vion is firmly committed to her 39 inches of silky weave down her back, designer nails and flashy eyelashes. (Rest in Peace my beautiful 1st born daughter Charity).

Support. Did I say support? Let me rethink that. I had resources, but not any physical help nor did any blogger or friend come detangle this nappy web of defiance. I can’t totally tell a lie, my son once helped me take out some twisties after I screamed in distress, HELP ME JESUS (not my son’s real name) and he did help me wash my hair.  I believed it was once because I cried out, MY BACK HURTS as I hovered over the kitchen sink while experimenting with my umpteenth new favorite shampoo. This one had avocados, coconut oil, bananas and jojoba. The smell was overwhelmingly good and it made my stomach growl as I realized the extent of my hunger.  I thought hmm I could just eat this while under this water and no one would ever know. By the third time I screamed out in agony my son came to assist me.  I think my son helped me out of pity because I was darn near crying and complaining so much, he felt sorry for me, or perhaps he was secretly eating my shampoo.   Lord knows I have minimal food on hand and I haven’t shopped for groceries in years and he is always hungry. 

Side Bar:  Eureka! I have my next new invention, edible shampoo, Wash n Eat.  I will probably just file that with my other underdeveloped inventions.  Oh, I must mention, I currently have about three or four useless inventions, Oh but one day, I WILL REVOLUTIONIZE The HAIR CARE WORLD with my latest invention.  I think I’ll write more about that later.

I just never knew that hair care and maintenance could be so overwhelming and stressful. Now I understand more fully why I preferred the beauty parlor and kitchen doos. They will insult you and your hair all under the guise of keeping it real. I feel like keep it to yourself and just do my hair, go somewhere with all that commentary and they do it all while smiling and acting friendly.  Girl bye.

 I don’t put anything past those kitchen doo friends either. They tell folks how nappy your hair is, discuss your edges, tell how you made their fingers bleed, how your hair was so short they now have arthritis.  They also say your hair was dirty, smelled like old weave. All kinds of stuff, if they are talking about somebody you know, they are talking about you, too.  Hell, I’ll tell the world how you tried to wash my hair with dirty dishes in your sink. Run tell dat.

Before I go into my hair journey, I want to share some thoughts and give some insight that also factored into my decision. Can I go back a minute?  If you’re in my age bracket, you’ve probably been getting your hair done for over 30 plus years, whether it was professionally done at the beauty parlor (yes, I still call it the Beauty Parlor) and for you, era conscious, cool folks, the Shop or the Salon.  Perhaps you experienced the old faithful kitchen doo. You know the homegirl hook up on a budget, actually one of my favorites.

Side Bar: I know several stuck up, bougie ladies that if you asked them, Where did you get your hair done? or Your hair did, they would hesitate, look up in the ceiling, pretending like they are trying to remember, look in their phone, change the subject, etc. In actuality they just don’t want to give it to you.

I used to think dang Gina share the information, your hair looks good, I like that!  I might want to try your stylist, too. Now I know, they were just being stingy with the information because you may possibly be going to their beauty parlor and in some way, somehow impact their accessibility and their wait time. Last thing they want to see when they come to their appointment is you sitting up in the chair talking about hey girl and they got to wait. No ma’am.   Saturday at the beauty parlor is an all-day event and you know folks have things to do.  I get it now, but some of those heffas were just rude and nasty and didn’t want anyone else to be cute…hmmm……might write about that later.

In high school, I thought there would never be anything that could top the JHERI CURL but the next new cultural hair revolution phenomenon was the Weave.  I would be amiss if I didn’t give a shout out to the JHERI CURL. Now the JHERI CURL caught on fast too. It was like a hair epiphany.  A jewel of wonder of how all of the tight kinky hair, became loose and wavy curls.  I remember the guys were just as happy.  They had a couple of sayings. I got curls for the girls and Waves for the babes. All of a sudden there was a sway everywhere.  Girls got cuter and boy became more handsome. 

Personally, I liked the Jheri curl because it made your hair grow and it made your hair manageable, but the upkeep was terrible--daily mass doses of Good Fred Oil or Luster Silk. What was known as the "JHERI CURL JUICE '' would run down your neck, drip off the ends of the curls and ruin the best of shirt collars. LESS IS MORE.  I don’t believe there was a dry JHERI CURL in Pomona, California, mine was nice and juicy. I remember some products that were turning everyone’s JHERI curl orangish. I can clearly see those big bone blue rollers and whatever that stinky liquid stuff they put on to change the naps to curls. Let it sit for a while, rinse and Hocus Pocus take out the rollers and you are good. The first couple of days the curls were kind of thin but baby by that next week hmmmppp you were good.   One good Jheri curl head back in the day was Ice Cube from the rap group NWA. Yeah, they were wearing the curls in Long Beach and Compton, too.

Blazing on the trail of the JHERI CURL was the weave. I thought I had died and gone to heaven. Weaves were the best thing ever!  I dived in immediately. They were brand new and not quite as sophisticated as they are now.   One of my memorable weaves had me looking like a cross between Diana Ross and Chaka Khan or so I thought.  It was super big, curly and bushy. I was singing along with Diana, I’m coming out, I want the world to know and I feel for you.  I was in Hog Heaven for sure! Beautiful long hair that you don’t have to remove or use a million bobby pins for security. My weaves became more impressive as stylists perfected their craft. I could hardly wait for the next style. My only drawback was the time that it took to get a weave and the time it took to take it out.  Over the years, I’ve had every weave imaginable.

Weaves initially were not well made. The quality of the hair was not so great and there was an excessive amount of shedding. That hair would get all in your sink, all over your floor. You could even find some in your underwear.  The quality started to improve and I moved on from synthetic hair that would ball up tight at the nape of your neck to good quality hair, like Remy, Hollywood, Brazilian