Do You Remember Prom Night, Pt. 1 (Hairy Situation)

Being that it's prom season—just over for some and just starting for others—I started reminiscing on my own high school dance. It took place way back in May of 1994 when I still had Kriss Kross braids. Before I get into the actual night let me give y'all a little back story.

A few months before prom my girlfriend Jessica told me she needed some "space." I was a late bloomer and this was my first relationship, my first love, my first everything, so I was a little unclear on what this "space" meant or why she needed it. In retrospect, my pucci-whipped self was probably a little smothering at that point but hindsight is 20/20.

In my 17-year-old mind, I thought a week or so of not hanging out would be enough "space" but I quickly found out that she required much more time than that. It was probably a month and a half before I finally got the picture that there was no guarantee that we would get back to our normal "space."

Although I backed off, we still hung in similar circles. So one day at the lunch table everyone was talking about prom and Jessica mention something about going. From my recollection, she and I had long discussed not going and trying to hit the Beautiful Mount Airy Lodge in the Poconos (those commercials with the champagne glass bubble baths were the ish back then). Clearly, something had changed in regards to those plans. But space or not, if Jessica was going to the prom, she was going with me.

#EndOfStory

After a brief conversation, we cleared things up and despite kinda-sorta not being together we would be each other's date for the prom. We figured out who's limo we were going to share and I got my mom to cough up the dough for the fee and found a tuxedo rental spot down on Queens boulevard. Everything was in order for May 12, 1994 except one thing: my hair.

Like I said earlier, this was before I had locks and was still rockin' braids. It had been a few weeks since I'd had them done so they were looking a bit frazzled. Prom was on a Thursday night so I called my cousin Donna to re-braid my hair the weekend before. She came through that Saturday and spent hours untangling my hair.

After complaining the whole time, Donna undid the final braid and looked at the clock. "I need to get out of here," she said. "You need to just cut this all off."

"Wh-what? But you said you’d braid it for me."

"This took way too long."

"But prom is this week. What I'm supposed to do?"

"That's not my problem... Just cut it cause I'm out."

I couldn't believe she left me hanging like that but I'll be damned if I go to prom with my hair looking like I was Don King’s son. I started my twists myself a year ago before they got too long, so I figured I had no choice but to do it myself. So I hopped in the shower and washed my hair so I could get started first thing in the morning.

The next day I got up and washed my hair yet again. Once it was dried I set up a bar stool in the bathroom and began to make my best attempt at double twisting my hair. I sat there for a good three hours taking strands of hair and transforming them into mini rope-like twists. It was far from perfect but it was better than nothing.

Being that I'd washed my naturally curly hair like four times in the span of two days my hair was extra soft and the twists were far from tight. In fact, when I went to school the next day my hair would bounce when I walked and blew in the wind. That may look cool in Snoop Doggy Dogg’s “Gin & Juice” video when he got a hot press, but for me it was more of a hot mess.

"What's up with your hair," was the question I was bombarded with all day.

The same thing happened when I saw Jessica, who added another question: "You know you’re not going to prom with me with your hair looking like that, right?"

"I know, I know, I'll fix it… I still have time."

My plan was to give my homemade twists technique one more try. Being that I went to a Catholic high school, we were off Thursday and Friday for Ascension. Prom wasn’t until Thursday night so I had all day to either fix my hair or cut it off, but the latter wasn't really an option I wanted to consider.

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