Grade 12 Creative Writing Portfolio

      A famous proverb once stated, “The most powerful relationship you will ever have is the relationship with yourself.” Throughout my early adolescence, I had always thought otherwise. I believed that if others were to like me, I would finally be able to like myself, too. “Different” was the last thing I wanted to be. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

      I was in 6th grade when I bought my first hair straightener. Wow, I thought, I can finally transform this frizzball into something presentable. “Presentable”, to me, had always been what was popular; how I perceived everyone else to appear. I needed my hair to be long and silky, just like all of the other girls’, in order to be content. Through hours of straightening, my curls popped and sizzled, and nearly smelt of a forest fire; but I didn’t care, because what I saw in the mirror was straight hair-- kind of. Unfortunately, my hair never did reach my standards of perfectly straight and silky, as the weather always seemed to work in favor of my natural hair. So instead, to abandon any evidence of having an afro, I wore it in a bun for the next two years. It wasn’t until I reached high school, after years of struggling in contention with my hair, that I began to accept it, and therefore myself, for who I truly am.

         No woman is ever really content with her hair. Straight hair is always too boring; wavy hair is always bipolar; curly hair is always too difficult to handle. However, I’ve realized that complaining about it isn’t going to change it. Until I grow old and it completely falls out, my hair will continue to be big and poofy, whether I like it or not. But, according to the many people who have complimented my kinks over the years, it’s best that I do like it. No two individuals that roam this planet have the same hair. My curls make me unique from everyone else, as does the blue hair of a Caucasian teenage girl and the nappy hair of an African-American woman. I believe in celebrating my differences, because they make me who I am. I believe in loving myself, because I only have one life to live. I believe in self-acceptance, because to be beautiful is not to be accepted by others, but rather by myself. I am my hair, and my hair is me, and that is that.