Confrontation Part II
Funny how life can be.
You can plan, plan, and plan some more.
That does not mean that your works, your efforts, will eventually lead
to a happy ending. You can work your ass
off. You can study, research, and ask mentors
for the right thing to do. All of that
hard work does not necessarily mean that you will see the desired result.
When I planned on confronting a person it did not happen.
Boom. Nothing.
It felt anticlimactic.
I read about forgiveness, read about communication techniques to engage
the respondent, asked people I trust about how to ask questions without
sounding like I have already made up my mind in judgement of the
respondent. I did some work about how to
tackle a situation so that everyone involved would feel heard and respected.
The person has greeted me with insults. He said things like “You need to comb your
hair” “I’m going to give you some money so you can go to the beauty supply” and
“I’m calling the beauty shop to make you an appointment”. Now, I am quite familiar with capping,
ranking, bagging, playing the dozens, and throwing shade. I grew up in urban San Francisco with a gang
load of boys around me who liked to sit around and cap on each other. Insulting the person, usually beginning with “yo
momma” was common. I have absolutely no
problem tossing it back with a “no homie, yo momma…”. No big deal.
The problem starts when you do not know if you are capping or if you are
in a capping situation. If someone keeps
greeting me with some sort of cap, I question that ish. Does he want to cap? Does he want to keep a running ass cap every
time he sees me? Like a text thread
where you keep adding to it every day. The
backdrop of the caps can occur in my home, my church (!), in a public
gathering, in front of mutual friends, in front of his friend but not a friend
to me, and other countless places, situations, days.
From what I can remember, the insults are hurled at me when
I am wearing my hair in its natural state.
Wavy, curly, frizzy hair in its natural state. The way the hair grows out of my scalp. I’ve always worn my hair natural, before it
became called wearing natural hair. It
was just my hair. I also flat iron my
hair, wearing it straight, pin curled, curled with an iron, you name it. Like I told someone before, I’m versatile
like that. For someone to keep speaking
about my natural hair, I want to know the origin of his words. Are you not liking my natural hair? Is it a way of expressing what you want to
say, which is a critique of my natural hair?
I want to know so I can then let you know.
If it is indeed a cap, well hell, let the capping games
begin. I will let you know why I am a
champ. Don’t get mad when I go in,
either.
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| Natural Hair |
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| Curly, wavy natural hair |
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| Straightened hair |
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| Poufy natural hair |
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