Category: Life Changes

December 11, 2022, Ájá was born, and she’s thriving!

On Saturday, January 04, 2025, I ventured to my loctician’s place for her to wash and retighten my hair. For those of you who have followed me on my locs journey since December 2022, thank you for still being here. I am so in love with my hair, it’s not even funny. I do not know how to describe this feeling I get every time I look at Ájá’s progress. From the very first post I shared about this journey to the last one before today, I have grown right along with my hair, and it has been such an amazing time for both of us!

Because I am a curious person, and I wanted to know how many locs I have managed to grow from the roots–I asked my loctician if she would count them. And count them, she did! As of yesterday, I have 186 locs! Y’all, wOW! I told my co-worker this past Friday I wanted to know exactly how many I have, and she looked at me, smiled, and said, “A LOT!” And we both giggled like two little school girls watching our crushes push words together to shoot at some other little girls who aren’t pennies to our dimes. Knowing this number gives me an idea of just how much hair is on my head. Knowing this number catapults my love for Ájá to even higher heights. It signifies G R O W T H, literally.

And with all of this happiness about my hair, I fell into sadness when I realized I could not share any of this with Chrissy. Try as I might, I failed miserably when the tears started to fall. I do not have my cousin around to run to with the details of these milestones. I can’t hear her smile through the phone–see her well up with joy over my excitement–listen to her congratulatory words of appreciation and wisdom . . . It has been hard these last two years and eleven months, and February will be three years she has been gone. I still have her number saved in my phone. I won’t delete it. I have so many of her old text messages as screenshots and I pull them up from time to time and reread them.

I am grateful for the many memories we created. What hurts the most is when I see some of my family members back home or I share photos of me with them and they say, “Ooh, you look just like Chrissy,” and I have to smile and nod–nod and smile, and say, “Yes, I am told this often.” It feels like raising a mirror up to one’s face only to be saddened by what is reflected back to you. It’s grief, I know, and I also know it comes in waves. It never gives up. It lingers in the shadows, simply waiting for the right time to strike again.

But I sat with my feelings. I sit with my feelings of sadness when they come. I acknowledge them. I allow them to have their say in the matter. I pull out a chair for their company and when they have finished expressing themselves, I breathe a heavy sigh of relief, and I try my best to move on. They will always be here and grief will pop up occasionally to remind me I am still a living, breathing, and feeling human being. And I can’t be mad at that.

It’s the Little Things, as India Arie says, that gets me through every single day. And something as simple yet magnificent as the growth of my hair lights up my life.

Above is Ájá’s growth in phases. From 2022 to 2023, and 2023 to 2024. Then, finally, from 2024 to present day in 2025. It stupefies me on so many levels that something as strong as hair can go from 3 inches to 6 inches to 8 inches, and that it will continue to grow as long as one cares for it and maintains its health.

Isn’t that us, too, though? We will continue to grow as long as we or someone else nourishes, cares for, and maintains our heart, mind, body, and soul? The wondrous thing about being alive is knowing your chances of changing and blooming into who you want to be comes along when you awaken to another day. And every day I am gifted, I will use to continue to bloom. I have been planted in this place to shoot through the dirt and share who I am with other living, breathing human beings.

And really, why would I not want to do just that? I began this journey with microlocs, however, some of my locs have matted and combined to become one and are bigger than microlocs, so I have begun simply saying, “locs.” At first, I couldn’t believe this was happening. It was as if my hair decided to morph without my permission, and then I said to myself, “Love, your hair is doing what it is meant to do.” And now, I welcome whatever it is doing as it continues along this winding path of ours.

Whatever Ájá has in store for us, I am here for it–all of it! This . . . this place she has led me to is a place I love and every bone in my body has no intention of moving at all. This is where we will be until the party becomes the after-party.

And even then . . . we’ll still be around somewhere. You’ll just have to look for us. But you won’t have to search long. And on that, I give you my word.

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