On growing and wearing dreadlocks.

As anyone with a pair of working eyes can see, wearing dreadlocks has become an increasing trend over the past few years. Yours truly is not exempt, as I have been wearing them for close to three years.

Sometimes I get questions from people such as "how long have you had them?", "why did you decide to get/grow them?", "who started them/maintains them?", and the ever-funny, at least to me, "how long are you gonna let them get?" I'll answer all four of those here.

1) Almost three years, lol.

2) I have two reasons for growing dreadlocks:

• I like my hair, simple as that. For the longest time, I had wanted to grow my hair out. While I was in school, though, if my parents told me to get a haircut, I got a haircut. It wasn't until senior year that I actually started to grow my hair, and I had a pretty decent-sized fro in my senior prom picture (which I can't find). Admittedly, my younger brother grew his hair out first, and I deemed that it was ok by my parents to grow mine. Somewhere deep down, I had always wanted dreadlocks (probably as early as age 12), but I wasn't allowed. Again, parents' house, parents' rules.
• All through my undergraduate college years, I had worn cornrows and braids. As it got harder to find somebody to braid my hair on a regular basis, I thought once again about locking my hair. I knew that my fiancée (who is now my wife) didn't like them, so I was a bit hesitant. Once she said to me "You know what? I think you would look good with dreads," it was on and poppin' in a matter of days.

3) I started them (with some help) with two-stranded twists. As it stands, I have only had them maintained by someone else exactly twice, both times before my wedding. After the second time and realizing that (1) I didn't like the overly neat look enough to get it on a regular basis, (2) I now hate sitting under hair dryers with nothing to do, and (3) I like having only my hands in my head for a length of time, I decided to maintain them myself from now on. It allows me more freedom as far as when I decide to perform maintenance, wash (this is a big one), and how I want it done. And it saves a whole lot of money.

4) If the person asks about length, I say "as long as they'll go." If they ask about expanse of time, I say "until I get sick of them."

Thinking back, I actually almost decided to start growing dreadlocks much earlier in college. But I wasn't ready. I think that when I did start them, after reading a lot of information about them from Internet sites, I was better informed about the whole process.

It's almost unfortunate that I started growing them right around when it became more popular in the hip-hop community. Like another blogger, Tai, has said on numerous occasions, usually when you see a Black man with dreadlocks on TV, he's portrayed as a thug or some other kind of miscreant. Granted, but I often see many much less controversial figures out there in the public eye (Tye Tribbett, Mac the doulos of Everyday Process, Manny Ramírez, every NFL player not named Pacman Jones or Chris Henry) who wears dreadlocks. I understand what he's saying though... the whole one-bad-apple-spoils-the-whole-bushel principle. :)

Moreover, it's not that I have anything against hip-hop culture (and anyone who knows me knows that I don't), but I didn't grow them to be faddish. And though I don't wish to be judged by my hair, I do hope that the manner in which I present myself shows that I'm not one who does something because it's the thing to do.

One more thing, as I wrap this up... I often read about people getting dreadlocks "put in." Not surprisingly, these are always Black women saying this. I'd like to offer a suggestion to my sistas, and I hope they take it with love:

You "put" weave "in." You "grow" dreadlocks.

That's all for this installment. Who knows what I'll discuss next time...