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It is hard for any woman to contemplate cutting off her hair, but I submit that it is even tougher for black women. If we are honest, most of us try to minimize the ways our appearance departs from mainstream (read: European) beauty standards. And standards say that part of our beauty lies in our hair-hair that should be long, silky and preferably flaxen.

Currently, the ethnic hair care market is about $1.5-2.0 billion per year in the United States. Black hair care products make up the largest single group of this market. For a population that lags behind in accumulating wealth, we spend a whole lot of cheddar on frying, dyeing and weaving in hair that once belonged to women of other ethnicities.

Most sisters will tell you only a mad woman would cut off perfectly good hair. And to cut off straight hair to reveal a natural head of coils and kinks? Doing that takes a pair of brass ovaries.

So, I walked into the salon one Saturday morning in August 2006, having made the decision to reclaim my natural locks, but adamant that I would hold on to my length for as long as possible. I reckoned I'd just have my stylist blow my roots super-straight to match my relaxed hair. And, yes, I knew this was potentially damaging to my tresses, but vanity

I held on to this idea at the shampoo bowl, even as water hit the strands of my natural roots and they began to wind and coil, creating an impenetrable foundation.

My stylist, who, by the way, wears awesome looking dreds, frowned. "Uh-uh. I can't do anything with your hair like this. You're going to have to cut the perm out."

I whined something about my head being too big for me to wear my hair short. I've been thin and I've beenernot thin, but one thing never changes: my chubby cheeks and round face. I could see myself rolling out of the salon looking like a bald bobble head. Leave it to a black hair stylist to tell it like it t-i-tis.

"Look, when I went natural, I just cut the permed hair off," she said. "Yeah, I know I have a big head and a pie face, but girl, it's not like folks can't see that when my hair is long."

So true.

I took a deep breath and said, "Cut it off."

I sat, my back to the mirror, and watched straight hair rain down around me, as my stylist cut first with scissors, then with clippers, whose buzz sounded as ominous as a dentist's drill. Finally-a little moisturizer and a dollop of gel-and I was whirled around to facemewith barely an inch of hair. I loved it!

There is something I have always found beautiful about African women with close-cropped hair. Look at the footage of those little girls at Oprah Winfrey's school in South Africa. You see them and focus on their expressive, beautiful faces. You can look into their eyes-the windows to the soul, y'know-unhindered by anything that obscures where their true beauty lies.

Without my hairand without unnaturally straight hairI felt liberated and, frankly, more beautiful.

That was a year and a half ago. I can pull my coils down to reach my shoulders now. I can twist my hair, pull it back into a puff or let my BAA fly (That's big-ass afro). I love the versatility of my longer hair, but I will always cherish those early days of my natural journey, when I took it all off.

Learn more about this author, Tami Winfrey Harris.
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