About Queen Tosh or Writing Addict as she is affectionately known:
On the Road to Queendom, I decided to start this blog, after the urging of my family. I have been rocking locs for a little over 9 years now. I started the locking process after attending a Lauryn Hill concert. I remember it so well, I settled down in my seat preparing for an outstanding show...little did I know I would emerge a bit transformed. I felt Lauryn's power when she walked out onto that stage. She was bold, fierce, and naturally beautiful. I had never really experienced a feeling like that before. I went to the hair salon the very next day, sat in the beauticians chair and demanded that she cut off my chin length bob. She could not understand it...she almost refused to do it until I threatened to do it myself with her scissors. She did it all the while cursing.
I remember my new short do...feeling the breeze on my freshly shorn relaxed locks. I felt so free and powerful. I couldn't wait to start getting my twists. Which I did. My hair was so short the loctician had to struggle to make some twists, lol. I didn't care....I was ready.
Let me just say that it has been a long, transformational journey. My whole way of thinking has changed. I used to be so heavy into making myself beautiful...that I never really saw myself, or appreciated the natural beauty that I possessed. I remember purchasing a new bag of weave a week, the acrylic nails, the colored contact lenses. The pang of emptiness I felt, the way I ran to the drugstore every two weeks, to make sure my edges were straight, and laying down. I was so busy trying to look beautiful on the outside that I totally forgot about the inside.
So, when I went natural...I went all the way. I stopped eating meat for about two years, I began practicing yoga, and meditation. I wanted to get in touch with myself completely. I wanted to face myself head on...I remember standing in front of a mirror that same day I got my first ultra short hair cut. No makeup, nothing, just me, myself, and I. I began to cry, because I had forgotten who I was. I cried because I knew deep down, I didn't like who I was, because of low self-esteem. I cried finally because I was free of all of that.
So, my path to Queendom didn't come easy, there were days, I wanted to slap the weave in or don a wig. I had to endure a grandmother that called me nappy headed, who stated that NO man would ever want me the way that I looked. I had to endure racial profiling in Georgia because the police officers didn't know if I was a woman riding down the highway with my other short haired female friends. I had salesmen follow me around the store because I guess I didn't look right with that super short hair, and I posed some sort of threat to them in their own sick and twisted minds.
I endured it, and I love who I am, a Queen. A beautiful sister who posses insight, and natural beauty inside and out. I hope that I reach one sister out there who is teetering on the line between getting that relaxer or going completely natural. I went through it and emerged a Queen, and you can too!
