Cutting My Hair to Free Myself from Capitalism

The day I wore an Afro puff to my old job in higher education three years ago was the first time I wanted to quit. It was our final-round student interview—the day when we’d select the scholarship recipients to attend one of our partner colleges. That evening, I greeted a Black college administrator at our local office, both of us bracing ourselves for the evening’s outcome. I noticed her hairstyle, almost identical to mine.

As I sat to begin the interview, my supervisor nervously fiddled with her skirt’s hem. “Next, I’d like to introduce Fullamusu.” She motioned not toward me, but to our newest Afro-puffed office addition. I cut eye-daggers at the mistake, but she didn’t budge. When I spoke from across the room, the offender turned her head, crossing and uncrossing her legs uneasily as she sat with her glaring error.

She did not apologize after, instead fumbling through the evening with no recourse. As a passive apology, she offered me a half-empty bottle of wine as we cleaned up, mum on her error.

That night, I cried bitterly in my boo’s arms. Though I wanted to resign after one year, leaving was a luxury I couldn’t afford. I needed the security of a salary and health benefits.

*

Unfortunately, I always stood out as a child. I spent weekends under the care of my hairstylist aunts, each of them premiering their latest hair experiment with my tresses. I sat quietly in their laps, afraid to ask for the hairstyles I truly wanted—soft pressed curls or elaborate braid patterns with colorful beads—because I was taught by my family to avoid nitpicking to preserve my blessings.

In my aunt’s living room one evening, I stepped up reluctantly and finally whisper-asked for the desired style. Finally, I’d fit in. That Monday, I returned to school with the ghost of my dream style: a short bob with bland wooden beads. My classmates clowned the infamous look and each comment poked at my insecure middle school self. I sulked during class, sliding each bead one by one from my braids, mentally fading myself into the school’s alabaster walls.

When my aunt asked what happened, I lied. They fell out.

Beadgate birthed my new ritual of self-making. For years, I’d spend Fridays buried under mountains of Kanekalon with aunties, then work early Monday-morning hair miracles with an arsenal of bright headbands to flex my power. I discovered the InStyler the summer before senior year and subsequently fried the everlasting fuck out of my ends with daily straightening. As an inexperienced hairstylist, I loved the freedom of my hands guiding my own hair.

As an inexperienced hairstylist, I loved the freedom of my hands guiding my own hair. 

As senior pictures approached, I begged my mom for a ride to a salon, where I sat, stunned in the salon chair, as my hairdresser explained my hair’s irreparable damage. When the word cut left her mouth, my heart fluttered at my fresh start. For the next few hours, my mother squirmed as my shoulder-length heat-damaged hair transformed into a short pixie cut. I wore my hair proudly to my senior pictures and wrote my college essay about asserting independence during that salon trip. It was my affirmation that I could make decisions for myself.

*

My job was a hot mess when racial uprisings shook June 2020. Some partner colleges garnered national attention when white students laced campuses with nooses on trees. Our national office responded via email, thanking students for their resilience as my Black and brown colleagues soothed fuming parents of color who feared for their children’s lives. I sent follow-up notes to Black students, wishing to more honestly fill in the gaps in the messages: Yes, this country is thirsty for your blood and I’m sorry I can’t protect you.

For two years, working with my supervisor was a battlefield. She lectured me for refusing to socialize after work hours and burdened Black women with two-person workloads often. When Black women approached her about her inflicted harm, she cried, making it almost impossible to truly acknowledge her actions.

One scorching Friday morning, I broke. I awoke in a pool of sweat one week after my AC’s estimated delivery date. The day before, I’d attended a “defund the police” protest on my street where the police had brutally attacked an old coworker. I had no energy left to give my job.

In the thick of the Chicago humidity, I drafted a delirious email to my supervisor expressing my inability to concentrate on work. To my disbelief, she drove an hour from suburbia to my South Side doorstep with my Home Depot AC and Shake Shack, offered sympathy, and, of course, requested I let her know if there was aaaanything she could do. My supervisor pilgrimaged across Illinois to apologize without saying the words I’m sorry. It was another half-empty wine bottle, her passive white flag after years of voiced concerns from Black staff.

Once she left, I stepped into my home to a ringing phone. It was the director of an organization I’d previously volunteered with, praising my relationship-building skills and proposing a paid position. I had to accept. This organization was the political home where I’d planted my first seeds upon moving to Chicago. There, I’d existed in an ecosystem of meaning, spending my first few adult summers weeding community gardens and planting sunflowers for our fallen youth members. I’d left the beloved organization only to sell my soul to a supervisor whose compassion felt conditional. It was time to return home.

*

I arrived at my former home to an unfamiliar sea of staff faces. The organization had undoubtedly gained more structure in my absence, but there was an inescapable hierarchy between my new boss, the staff, and the youth participants that tinged our radical beliefs.

Work tensions intensified as coworkers abruptly left the job following power struggles with my boss. I defended her as a trusted friend and stifled my own doubt by drowning myself in work. But I needed to feel alive again. For months, my boo had been meditating on cutting his seven-year-old locs, and I was inspired to do the complete opposite with an unplanned cut. On a weekday afternoon, I popped into a salon and asked for a big chop. The stylist made small talk, questioning my decision, but my answer was nondescript: “I just want something to make life easier.”

“Cutting your hair is a big deal, isn’t it?” chimed an older woman from the next chair over.

I flinched. Cutting my hair was, at this point, my most consistent party trick in distress. After my high school stunt, I chopped my hair during my undergraduate senior year to cope with my impending long-distance relationship. Each season of haircutting marked a major life shift, and I recoiled because I was tired of transitioning. I just wanted to be.

Cutting my hair was, at this point, my most consistent party trick in distress. 

The cut was speedy, and, after the last snip, I looked down at heaps of black curls surrounding me. The sea of hair steadied my nerves. Post-cut, I felt bolder. But when friends complimented my short tufts, I bit my tongue. I wanted to go even shorter, but I was afraid. Being bald meant an unrecognizable me, and I was terrified of not knowing myself.

*

One year post–big chop, I sat attentively as my boo worked the clippers through my hair. His hand slipped, and “a little off the top” turned baldie fast. Tears and lumps of hair mingled in my lap. For the past month, I’d been clashing with staff at my new job; I convinced myself that longer hair would cure my conflict. The logic’s absurdity matched that month, but I was desperate. I just wanted to be treated with softness and thought femmeness would protect me. I sat, weeping for my armor on the bathroom floor. I’d lost all control, but I trusted him when he wiped my tears in apology, offering to make things better.

As my hair grew out, African Violet was my color choice for the dye. I camped out in my impromptu bathroom lab, sprawling my brushes and supplies on every available surface. My hands worked the carefully portioned powder and liquid mixtures into a creamy paste. I bowed at the mirror and dripped my head in purple, unsure which shade I would uncover. Every few minutes, I dashed out of the bathroom in a frenzy, pressing my boo to point out the spots that needed more dye. In just a few hours, I miraculously achieved my desired science. I locked eyes in the mirror with a new, unafraid person and embraced the imminent storm.

*

At the community organization, my new boss was my close friend until conflict crept in. Before that, she was my daily phone call. We vented and dreamed up futures with our own underground support networks. We delivered food to each other’s homes on emotionally draining days and drank moonshine under the night sky. Suddenly, we broke.

My boss made a decision on behalf of young people, and I trusted her, but I spoke up when I learned that our actions harmed young people. Our nightly phone calls were static, and, in our last conversation, I discovered I had been demoted from friend to coworker. I finally confessed: There’s no vulnerability in this. I know you want to trust me but you don’t. My words blew the final crack in our friendship, and my work life crumbled. Staying was combative, and, during a therapist-advised medical leave, I reckoned with the grief of losing my home again.

One year after quitting my last job, I sent a weaker, less confident letter of resignation to the community organization. I boiled my reasoning down to value differences. Leaving was ugly. While most young people offered well wishes, one called me a quitter. It wasn’t a lie.

The weeks following were steeped in self-admonishment: I hadn’t tried hard enough. Each sleepless night and skipped meal hadn’t been enough; I should have sacrificed more of myself to stay. It was capitalism’s ugliest lie that I’d refuted at my last job, but this one was different. Here, I was a community failure.

Speaking about my experience with the publicly heralded organization felt like putting family business in the streets. When folks asked, I led conversations with hushed tones. My pain and loyalty to my once home muddled into guilt.

As bills piled up, life’s grasp slipped through my fingers again and left me bitter. Unemployment claims were denied, and, soon, I spent hours pleading for a break with debt collectors. In the deepest throes of depression, I craved the promised peace of death and clung to my discounted therapy sessions as a last hope.

A trip to the beauty supply saved me from myself. That summer, wisdom spoke through Adore’s semipermanent emerald dye. After another bathroom-lab dyeing session, a close friend dubbed it “the color of the summer.” It was everywhere: splashed onto graffiti murals, along Charleston’s flower-lined streets and coastal shore when I performed a healing ritual. It was lifegiving during my depressing post-quitting months and was reassurance that speaking up for myself was my protection.

*

On the eve of my twenty-eighth birthday and fresh off the heels of my new full-moon ritual, I was almost bald again. It was a mirror moment. Me between the arms of my boo, him struggling with clippers through my now-faded green hair. I stood up and asked for the tool, curious about the machine mechanics and, admittedly, impatient. With just the right amount of pressure, the hair disappeared. The clipper’s gentle buzz was the soundtrack to my ritual. I ran my fingers across my scalp, taking in this lighter part of myself.

My haircut ritual reminded me that intention carries my self-making practice. I have been unlearning self-judgment for choosing silence for my survival and, instead, celebrating the ways I’ve fought back. This ritual of cutting, dyeing, and adorning my hair taught me that amid the suffering, I could always tend to my shattered parts and start again.

Capitalism has thrived in my conformity and self-hatred. I quit to refuse this system’s complete control of the conditions of my survival. I quit because writers create new realities. I quit because I treasured my integrity.

I’ve untethered myself to full-time employment as a current teaching artist working toward rebuilding myself, emotionally and financially. And yes, when my hand has itched for hair dye, I’ve indulged, but I have learned to embrace this spontaneity like the color emerald. Like all this color has trailed me to where I need to be.

• 0