A year ago: is my hair long enough?

My hair was free to roam.

A year ago today, I was fretting over my hair.  I'd made up my mind that I was going to lock it, but I wasn't sure if it was long enough yet.  My patience being what it is, I didn't want to wait.  I rationalized moving fast:

The main advantage of locking the hair when it's shorter is that it will take less time for my dreadful friends to help me.  The backcombing process can take six hours for 18 inches of hair, and is painful and tiring.

One year later, I know I wrote those words, but oh, I did not understand the meaning of "painful and tiring" when I posted that passage.  Nope, not by a long shot.

I daresay the locks have grown some.

My worries were for naught -- my locks have endured, despite the short hair we started with, and the controversial waxing, crocheting, and all the other hoo-hah that's been going into my nature-vs-nurture test.

And my hair has grown longer, too, but what I not sure 100% sure of is how much more they've locked in the past 50 weeks.  Living with them day after day makes it harder to notice change, and I'm not really sure how to measure it.

My friend Amanda Catherine, who hadn't seen me in a couple of months, just told me that my locks are lookin' fine, so that was a nice boost.  (I'll have her reason for dreadlocks posted here as soon as I can get her to hold still long enough to tell me about it.)

One thing I'm positive about is that I hate the length of my hair this April.  To much volume for a hat, not enough length to tie it back.  Of course, the milestone that everyone with locked hair looks forward to is being able to use a lock to tie back the rest of the hair.  At the base of my neck, my longest locks are about three inches, so that's going to be awhile.  Some people have told me that it's easier to shave the back of the neck than to get that hair to lock, but it's steady as she goes.

One day in . . .

Today I have bits of hair sticking to a light sheen of wax on my fingertips.  It means that every time I touch my nose I tickle it with some tiny hair, or fiber from my hat or sweater.  There is just enough wax on them to make the surface slightly sticky, accumulated from palmrolling my day-old dreadlocks.

Step 1:  section the hair

Yesterday, Earth Day, was a lot longer than I expected it to be, and completely exhausting.  My good wife set to sectioning my hair at about 1 in the afternoon, and we finished the final step of blow-drying the newly-waxed locks after eight.  We did have breaks for meals and such, but all told it was a solid six hours worth of work.

I expected it to take less time because my hair is on the short end of the range, but that actually made it take longer, for two reasons:

1. the learning curve was spread over more locks, and
2. there's a lot less hair to lock, so it takes more backcombing to get it together.

To expand, there's always a few "learning dreads" which aren't as tight as they could be, and have to be rebackcombed.  This is already sounding technical, so here's less than two minutes of video on backcombing to explain it:

The example of the ideal dread is all fine and dandy, but keep in mind that the first inch or more of each lock is not tangled, and won't look like that; my locks are all about three inches long each so that gives you about two inches of learning per lock, and those are tough inches since the poof percentage is elevated by the percentage of root hair.  We were three-quarters through my head when my wife said, "I think I'm starting to understand how this works," meaning that her tactile sensitivity to textiles was kicking in.

Agony above,
serenity below

One thing that was exactly as expected was the pain of having that done to every single square inch of my head.  Oh.  My.  God.  Maybe dreadlocks are like tattoos and childbirth (I've experienced the former and heard about the latter) in that you forget how agonizing the process is after you're through it and recall it through the hazy delirium of endorphins, but I don't think so.

The reason why is that I am going to have regular reminders of how much dreading sucked as they mature.  I get to do the palmrolling, and the clockwise rubbing, and the squeezing them dry when they're wet.  None of these things actually hurts much, but my brutalized scalp reacts to my touch the way Tina would to Ike's, and it all comes back to me again day after day.

Don't dread having a cat in your lap.

My friend Amanda Catherine told me that they'd by "spiky," and she wasn't kidding.  When I first saw what they looked like, before I put in any wax, I thought that they were being supported by rubber bands at the bases, but such was not the case.  Poofy, erect stalks covering my head, bringing forth images of electrocution caused by a game of "Truth or Dare" gone wrong.

The waxing took most of another episode to complete (we watched a couple each of "Buffy," "Xena," and "Jack and Bobby," and one of "Sliders" as well).  After I warmed it and worked it in, Robin took the blow dryer to it so it would melt and really get in there. The heat was enough on my inflamed scalp to make me gnash my teeth and rend my clothing, which is why I'm glad I was wearing a high-quality sweater from L.L. Bean, for it was quite resistant to rending.

I tried only briefly to put my beloved took on over this new head of mine before giving up.  The tam fit, but I put it on and removed it gingerly, since the locks are probably even more fragile that most new locks are.  Today I stabilized my locks more, and to my amazement got the took on over my Styracosaurus self.

The stabilization started with putting rubber bands at the base of each lock, in addition to the ones at the tips. This compresses the base just enough that I can get some results from palmrolling, which is the same motion used to make a snake out of clay.  With the wax in there, palmrolling compresses the lock and helps it stay that way as the locks tighten.  My regimen for the next month is going to be daily palmrolling of each lock, and adding a little bit of wax to the locks that don't have any left in them.  I think I already have a couple like that, but I'm paranoid about overwaxing so I'm going to wait a day.

As the sun sets on my hair's first dreadful day, I have a low-grade headache and feel like I'm wearing a constant state of surprise.  I may venture out this evening and see where my hair takes me.  Perhaps tomorrow I'll talk about the mental toll all that pain takes, unless I decide that I'm whining too much.

Today's the day!

Yep, I have chosen Earth Day as my locks' birthday.  I need to take one more before picture, to capture the moment for all time.

Then I'm going to wash my hair with dread shampoo and figure out how big I want 'em to come out.  This can get complicated, but these tips on sectioning for dreadlocks say I should be aiming for bundles of hair about the diameter of a pencil, which will make slightly thicker locks.  We will figure out how big the sections need to be.  It ranges from about half an inches to two inches for each square, and my hair is thick so I expect that about an inch per square will be about right. I want my locks to be consistent in thickness because it will look nicer and they will mature at the same rate.

Then I will squirt a bit of locking accelerator on them before the backcombing begins.

Crap, I need to figure out what we should watch on TV while we're doing this!

I dreaded this: the cat's out of the bag

Well I mentioned to a friend and business associate that I have plans for my hair, and now the world knows.  The mention included sharing the link to this blog with her on Twitter, and, social networking what it is, seeing it retweeted and posted on Facebook.

Samson, who had "seven locks of hair"

So in truth I'm thinking six people know, and maybe one of them actually knows me.  My secret isn't exactly safe, but it's secure it obscurity.

You may wonder why, if I wish to be private, I would choose to blog about this process on a platform owned by Google.  Or why I wouldn't pick a hobby that's a little bit less visible than transforming my hair into "locks like snakes."

I'm actually not trying to keep it secret (hence telling my social networking diva friend), but I do enjoy watching the process unfold slowly and build momentum.  The more people knowing and reacting the more I will have to write, but I don't want to just announce my intentions on CNN or anything because then it will feel forced, like adding too much buttermilk to the moss garden.

Fun fact:  locking hair makes it shorter, but it has the potential to be much longer than straight hair can be.  This is because it doesn't let the hairs that shed fall away, so the lock length is not limited by the maximum hair length your body can produce.

Got my dread kit!

Supa Dupa Dread Kit + Lock Peppa

I got my Supa-Dupa Dread Kit in the mail today (well, yesterday), exactly when it was promised.  Here's what I got in the box, which includes the kit and one add-on product:  dreading comb, dread wax, dread shampoo, lock accelerator, and Lock Peppa.  That last one is the product I added onto the kit.

So far, so good:  I was promised the kit in 5-7 days and got it in 6.  Everything I ordered was in the box.  Nothing was broken, there wasn't any unnecessary packaging, and there was absolutely nothing else in the box - they sent me an email, and I like that they didn't print the invoice out, too.

Dreading comb

The dreading comb is the crux of this entire adventure.  It's the tool that makes this a process of cultivation, rather than simply allowing it to grow wild.  My head's going to be an English garden, not an old-growth forest.

Backcombing can technically be done with any comb, but if it's not metal it's probably not going to hold up without breaking.  I'll be writing a lot more about backcombing, the technique which my team is going to use for the locking.

Dread shampoo

In terms of PR, I think the dread shampoo and its tag line ("dread don't have to be dirty") is top priority.  Not only is it possible to wash dreadlocks, it's a really good idea.  Good washing and drying practice helps the lock tighten up and keeps them healthy.  However, ordinary shampoo will do anything but.

Commercial shampoo has a whole lot of crap in it, crap that doesn't get rinsed out of locks the way it does out of "straight" hair.  (When you're talking dreadlocks, "straight" is hair which isn't locked.)  When I popped the top on this bottle, I didn't smell a blessed thing.

Dread wax

The wax is something that I'll use a lot of early on, and eventually not need at all.  You have to put a whole lot of in the new dreads, but re-waxing doesn't happen until there's none left in a particular lock.

DreadHeadHQ calls its wax Dread Butta.  The stuff is slightly yellowish (can you say "waxy yellow buildup?") and doesn't have any particular odor.  It has about the same consistency as coconut oil does at room temperature.

Locking accelerator is a product that's supposed to help the locks form.  It comes in a powder in this bottle, which has to be filled with water to whip the stuff up.

Not entirely sure what this stuff is supposed to do, but I'm going to make some kind of mass-instruction list about what to use when and how and maybe even why, so I can keep it all straight, which will hopefully keep my hair from staying that way.

I don't think there's much to be said about the elastic bands, although the kit came with 50 more than promised, which is cool.  Overdelivering makes good marketing sense.  The bands are black, which is especially stylish.  They're going to help keep the locks separated as they mature.  Natural dreads merge and separate over time, but I'm not going for that effect right now.

Why do I want dreadlocks?

Egads, what on earth am I doing this for?  Why do I want dreadlocks?  It's an important question, part of the whole mental-preparation process.  This video is definitely worth ten minutes of your time if you want to dread your hair.  I'll clue you in below if it's not worth spending ten minutes.

As Jonny Clean explains, knowing why I want dreadlocks is going to make it easier, because the reason will give me the commitment and the will to get through the hard parts.  For the first six months that's going to include:

• The long day of initial locking
• Daily palm-rolling of locks and checking for loose hairs
• Weekly waxing
• Regular washing, every two or three days for most of the process

My reason, and my commitment, will also carry me through as I learn to explain my hair, answer questions which I'm sure will get tiresome ("You wash your hair?" "Yes, I just can't use the chemical crap on most stores shelves because the residues will cause rot and mildew."), and potentially deal with bias or discrimination based on my appearance.

Writing a book about it isn't going to cut it - that's too circular.  For me, like many people, this is going to be a spiritual journey.  Where it starts will be with a desire to learn more patience, which is one of the reasons I admire trees and other plants as much as I do.  Trees can only adapt to the world by using one tool:  slow, methodical growth.  In comparison, blooming flowers and ripening vegetables in the garden seem swift, but gardens themselves are best improved year over year in the long haul.

Where the journey will take me after that is unknown - and that's part of the fun.  I like being surprised.

It looks like this will be happening in about a week or so, although the full cast and crew hasn't been lined up yet.