written by Love Isn’t Enough contributor Catherine Anderson; originally published in Hip Mama Magazine (Issue 44-Creativity Issue-October 2009)
When crazy hair day is posted
as this week’s Friday activity
(last week was a picture of your pet,
the week prior a souvenir…)
you, the mother of the only
African-American child
in the preschool class
has the right to
pause
and consider
your approach.
Do you comment,
boycott,
suggest an alternative,
adapt
or educate?
You consider
each of the above
in three second
intervals
and land
on the combination
you are most familiar with:
adapt and educate
When your son’s hair
does not invite
barrettes, gel, or braids
you have reason to consider
the value of
crazy hair day.
On the Thursday before
you mention to the teacher in your most
diplomatic
engaging
and cautiously insistent
voice that it would be appreciated if the class
could consider options for all kinds of hair
for success tomorrow.
Excuse me?
Well, crazy hair day can be a little
complicated for tight curly hair
like his.
A flash of realization washes over her face.
Oh my, I hadn’t considered..
It’s fine.
We’ll figure it out.
They have hair sprays
you tell her, in pink and blue..
Your scour the shelves of the drug store
and explain to the manager
wearing the toupee
your predicament.
45 minutes later
as the groceries melt in the trunk
you find it,
the perfect solution
tucked behind the blush
and the tanning cream
***
Three days later and Sam still has
silver sparkle intergalactic eyeshadow
in his hair-
in five
long
Star Wars pilot Darth Vader
stripes.
It was a huge success.
and lasted longer then the braids,
the gel, the rubber bands and
all the other
Caucasian hair accouterments.
Crazy.
Yes. I love this. I recently saw Crazy Hair Day on the school schedule and for a moment, panic, doubt, and then resolution flashed through my mind. I then realized that schedule was not meant for my daughters’ class. This year anyway.
My kids’ school has crazy hair/crazy hat day… my girls both won the last crazy hair day contest (we did a poofy ponytail and went buck wild with the barrettes, clips, & snaps)
Oh my word I love this. I can relate to evey word. We went through this just a few weeks ago. I went to three stores and couldn’t find any of the colored spray. I had a little panic attack wondering what on earth we could do. We ended up painting my son’s hair with washable tempura paint and a toothbrush! It created the most vibrant colors and he absolutely loved it.
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the ballerina bun is also a hair requirement that can discriminate against black participants.
o_O
I have never heard of “crazy hair day.” What is it supposed to be about?
@cocolamala – your comment about the ballet bun brings back memories. I did modern dance through high school and I remember my mom had to get me a fake ponytail for my recitals that I could wear as a bun or loose like in an 80s themed dance that we did involving a ponytail flip. (Wait a minute…It wasn’t an “80s themed dance”. It was the actual 80s! I guess I’m getting old!
) There was also a time when I was in a play in middle school and we were supposed to have our hair in updos with tendrils hanging down. At that point my hair was so damaged from relaxers that I was basically bald at the temples. Actually, when I did ballet as a little kid my unprocessed hair was healthy and long enough to be brushed up into a bun. Funny, I never thought about the racial aspect to these experiences until right now.
I used to be a competitive dancer and the way I worked around the whole ballet bun style is by using a fake pony tail piece and it worked like a charm. The one thing that gets me though is tights when it came time to buy tights they only and still do offer light tan tones nothing brown.
That’s wonderful, I wish you’d post a pic of him.
Wildly appreciate the comments all–Crazy Hair Day is an “event” at schools and preschools where one supposedly does whacky things with their hair –the crazier the better-to show school pride for example. Like everyone sprays their hair blue for a home game. In preschool it about doing silly things–like a pony tail on top, or boys with their hair teased and sprayed. My son refused the goofy wig option–so we went with the “silver sparkle intergalactic eye shadow” stripe in his tight curly hair instead.
We’ve never encountered Crazy Hair Day, but I’ve always thought the hair bun and uniform leotard rules in some dance schools was for the birds. How in the world does having a bun make you a better dancer??
Luckily, my daughter has taken hip hop classes at a local community center since she was little-where you wear what you want and your hair is left alone. Although her hair is not tightly curled and is once again long enough to be in a bun, it’s never been an issue. The best part is that the teachers have always made it clear that all forms of dance can be incorporated into others, so she’s still learned to appreciate some ballet-without the bun or the tights.
We have crazy hair day too. I was not forward-thinking enough to shop for hair paint in crazy colors. Fortunately it was “crazy hair and HAT day”. I did manage to find a crazy hat in my house LOL. He ended up not wanting to wear it longer than five minutes.
I am really glad to see this post though because it affirms my feelings of confusion and panic when I realized that his hair was not going to be easy to play with. I put so much effort into making sure he has a good cut and his hair is healthy & well groomed. It looks really good but is too short to get crazy with for just one day. I thought it was me being too stressed. I’m glad to see other parents felt the same way.
I’ve always thought the hair bun and uniform leotard rules in some dance schools was for the birds. How in the world does having a bun make you a better dancer??
You want your hair neatly off your neck so that you make a nice clean line and so that your teacher can see that you’re moving your body properly and not doing anything awkward. That’s also why dancers wear leotards, so that we can see how they’re dancing. You also don’t want your hair so fancy that people pay attention to your hair and not to their own dancing.
A uniform leotard policy ideally keeps students focused on their dance instead of on their outfits – and it hopefully means you notice how they dance, not how they look.
And a bun is a hairstyle that works well to keep the hair completely off the neck, unlike a ponytail or (heaven forfend) loose hair down to your butt. However, there is such a thing as going too far – if the hair is reasonably out of the way, that should be good enough. I can think of dozens of hairstyles common to black girls that would satisfy the goal of not being distracting and also being off the neck.
In high school, we were required to wear “ballerina” buns for chorus recitals. Fortunately our director was understanding, and girls with extremely short hair were just required to bobby pin it back as best they could, and if it could get into a ponytail it had to be done. I rocked my ponytail fro and it was great lol.
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