Confronting racism can be one of the toughest things to encounter. Whether it be a sickening comment, or the way you see or view a hateful symbol. Especially when it's tucked away in the closet but always peeking through the cracks of the door. Racism is not something people can try to hide now, now that time is evolving and social and societal acceptances begin to shift and change.
In the Bluest Eye, Black women and Black men are faced with inequality living amongst their White neighbors. The amount of pressure society yields on its children forces eyes to look down and smiles to smear. How bad does it have to get for our Black children to desire physical features of those that are white? Uncomfortable enough in their own skin that they would desire to be someone else; Someone that was them, but did not look like them.
In The Bluest Eye, Pecola admires Shirley Temple on the side of her cup. Desiring to be like her, aspiring to ingest her culture as she drinks her white milk. "We knew she was fond of the Shirley Temple cup and took every opportunity to drink milk out of it" (Morrison 23), Morrison wrote describing Pecola's interest In the cup. Washing down White culture, and washing away Black culture, she figured if she looked like her, then her woes would disappear. 
I used to press an iron to my hair to disguise what was underneath...
Or I could even take it back to two years ago, when I didn't even know I had curly hair... Or the closest I ever was to witnessing it, was when the hairs on my neck stuck out of my shower cap, and they curled up due to the humidity after a shower. Or even after I got out off the pool, the waves would turn up, and the length would crinkle.
Mother always told me the creamy crack was the way to go... Straight hair was just "easier to manage" as she would say.
And yanno', I never really understood what she thought about curly hair until I went natural.
Straight hair was easier to manage; and I will always hands down agree.
Ever since I cut off my straight hair to let my curls roam free, I'd be standing over the sink in my bathroom for 45 minutes, trying to achieve that bomb twist-out I pinned on Pinterest, and the bantu knots i'd watch on Youtube.
I'd always had a perm as a child, and for a black women to freely wear a fro was quite uncommon. It even made me feel as if they should tame their hair and conform to the flat iron as my mother had taught. I'll always respect the women with the coils and the ziggles that sprout from their gardens. They had the courage I didn't learn until last December. "Wherever it erupts, this funk" (Morrison 83), i'll let it fly and lay as it pleases. For the funk, makes me, and as I allow it.
Curly hair has always been portrayed as something that needs to be tamed and handled, and the media doesn't help to make people think otherwise. I won't suppress my curls to the steam of a pressing comb, or the sizzle of a flat iron.
i'll slick my baby hairs, following that bomb twist-out, and i'll watch the curls bounce in the mirror with a grand smile pasted across my face, as you should be happy with yours.
I wish "we were still in love with ourselves" (Morrison 74), because, if it were up to society; self-loathing would become quite the trend. Not in love with ourselves in terms of conceit, but being so in love with ourselves that flaws become a foreign concept, and that you are at peace with reflection in the water. It has become so difficult for people to take compliments because they feel obligated to compliment you back, rather than just saying thank you...Or, if you ever run into that one person that just cannot take a compliment, and they continue to try to explain as to why your compliment is invalid.
Or maybe they actually just can't take the compliment because they just don't think they look they way you say they do. And that's even more painful.
I wish we were so in love with ourselves that our confidence could be naked and we would not be afraid to cover up. Being comfortable in our own skin is probably one of the most important things that can't be taught in school, but one teaches itself. Somebody could spout to you "love yourself" , and that "you're beautiful" all day long; but it'll always amount to nothing if you don't believe it.
I wish those few didn't have to ask "What did we lack?" (Morrison 74), because without question, they'd examine themselves and find nothing that caught them up. Beauty would come in a variety pack and everyone would've created their own definition.
