By DENENE MILLNER

The torture usually came on Saturday evenings, in the kitchen. I’d be sitting on a stack of thick yellow phone books and a pillow, squished between my mother’s knees; she’d be perched on the hard wooden kitchen chair, bent over and leaning in at some ungodly angle, trying hard to tame the kinky curls at the nape of my neck with gobs of thick grease and a scorching hot comb.

I can still hear the sizzle of the comb on my hair and smell the thick, greasy, burnt hair scent clinging in my nose. I can’t tell you which hurt worse: The fire-red hot straightening comb or the pop my mom would give me with the wide-tooth plastic comb for not being still or screaming out in pain or breathing while she tried to “straighten my naps.”

From there, it just got worse. Like when my Aunt Sarah would braid my hair into cornrows so tight I couldn’t see straight. And when my mom paid a professional hairstylist to have my hair “relaxed” with skin-burning lye. And then there was that unfortunate time when my dad, left in charge of my hair while my mom spent a few weeks in the hospital, gave me a jherri curl. He read the directions off the box and went to work right there in the middle of the linoleum floor, just me and him.

Right.

This is the story of all-too-many brown girls everywhere—a story that some of us African American moms are desperately trying to change with our generation of daughters.

Which is why there was such an uproar recently when Newsweek’s Allison Samuels openly criticized Angelina Jolie, a white mom, for letting her adopted, Ethiopian-born daughter, Zahara Jolie-Pitt, sport hair Samuels said was “wild and unstyled, uncombed and dry. Basically: a ‘hot mess.’”

Now, I’m not going to jump in the middle of the raucous debate sweeping like wildfire through the internet; there’s been enough piling on from both sides of the issue without me adding to it (Should Zahara’s hair be wild and carefree? Should Angie take a black hair care class or two so she can “tame” Zahara’s hair? Why are we criticizing a 4-year-old’s hairstyle anyway?)

But I will say that even as an African American mom, it’s not easy being in charge of two heads of kinky, curly hair—not including my own—with little information, great trepidation, and horrible memories of the Saturday night torture. There were no books out there to help me figure it out when my girls were babies; all of the information in the parenting books focused on hair and skin that didn’t look or feel like my girls’. I mean, I knew everything there was to know about how to care for a baby with thin, blonde hair, and it seemed like every product in the kids’ shampoo section was made specifically for them. But what was I supposed to put in my baby’s hair? What would keep it from drying out? How was I supposed to comb it? What was I supposed to do as the texture changed, sometimes just on one side of her head? Was it safe to braid it? Pull it into puffs? Put barrettes in it? And what was a nice, curt, way of telling my mom’s friends that my kid’s hair was in an Afro, sans braids/puffs/hairclips/lye because I liked it that way and it was actually better for her?

To read the rest of my take on this whole Angelina/Zahara/Black Girl Hair Care saga, click HERE to check out my latest blog on Parenting.com.

You have to understand: My people had me in the woods from a Friday to a Sunday, roughing it at a beautiful but dusty campsite where the bathroom was full of bugs and the public shower wasn’t an option. Let’s just say that by the time I dragged myself back to the house from our first big family camping trip, I was in serious need of some pampering.

And, as if the pampering gods heard my cry, a package full of organic, handmade products from Vintage Body Spa was waiting on my doorstep when I got home. Vintage Body Spa owner and product mixologist Alyssa Middleton sent the products to me, Christie of My Life, A Work In Progress, Lorraine of Ask Wifey, and Jennifer of The Baby Makin(g) Machine to try out before and during The BlogRollers BlogHer or Bust Road Trip we took late last month, sweet, generous soul that she is. And I made quick work of putting what was in that box to some good use.

In my box was a cornucopia of scrumptious scrubs, facial masks, and lotions that brought your girl back from the camping dead. The Citrus Blast Whipped Sugar Scrub was absolutely divine—the citrus scent provided the perfect pick-me-up for my tired body, and managed to moisturize and exfoliate without leaving that annoying oily residue all over my body and my shower tiles (score!). The Rhasoul Clay, a centuries old natural clay harvested from the Atlas Mountains in Morocco, was absolutely decadent as a facial mask—a much-needed elixir for my seriously stressed out face. And you know the Shea Butter Lotion handled the ash, sans the greasy, slick feeling Shea Butter tends to leave when it’s in its natural state.

In no time at all, it was bye-bye camping funk—hello, scrubbed, rubbed, shined-up and smelling right me!

I know what you’re thinking—you want some, don’t you? Don’t you?! Well, I just happen to have a really nice Vintage Body Spa “Spa to You” Gift Set for a lucky reader. The set includes full-size samples of the following:

Butter Beans (moisturizing bath fizzies)
Suga Lips Lip Balm
Wherever Body Cream (rich body lotion)
Whipped Shea Butter
A few extra goodies from The BlogRollers

All you have to do is leave me a comment… yep that’s it. I will give you an extra entry if you friend Vintage Body Spa on Facebook and/or follow her on Twitter. Don’t forget to come back here and let me know you did it…m’kay?

The winner will be announced on The ChatterBox Show on FRIDAY AUGUST 7th at 10:00 AM EST. Be sure to tune in!

Can someone please explain to me why Burger King is using Sir Mix-A-Lot’s ode to ass to hawk 99-cents SpongeBob kids’ meals to the babies? Please?! I mean, damn—I’ve written before about how I do what I can to keep the BET watching to a minimum; when the remote does slip and fall on the channel that seems to serve up all ass, all day (except on the Lawd’s day, of course), I do my best to turn hyper-sexualized, misogynistic music and videos into teachable moments.

But how, exactly, do I escape the madness when women are popping their booties to a catchy burger beat while SpongeBob gets his boogie on in the background? Not in the middle of the night, but after school and during prime time, when my kids are watching? Oh, Mari and Lila get a good giggle when they catch this commercial on TV, which is way too often; they snicker and sniggle like they’ve just caught sight of something awfully naughty. Trust: My girls know there’s something just plain wrong about a commercial that pairs their beloved SpongeBob with a blinged-out “king” waltzing across the TV, measuring women’s behinds. And, er um, they’re 6 and 9.

Really, Burger King? Nickelodeon? For real, for real? Were there any moms in the room when you all decided this was appropriate fare for children? Any daddies? Anyone who knows firsthand the devastation both fast food and misogynistic music have wreaked on American children in general, and brown babies in particular?

Now, I know there are a lot of other battles we need to focus our energy on—the economy is still in the toilet, Iran is testing missiles and jailing journalists, Afghanistan just passed a law saying that women have to wear make-up and have sex if their husbands demand it, and, have mercy, Octomom still has all 14 of her kids. But as a mom looking to raise healthy, smart, confident little girls who can be comfortable in the skin—and bodies—they’re in without pimping them out for commercial purposes, I think I can take 10 minutes today to tell Burger King and Nickelodeon to get a clue.

The New Agenda, a non-partisan group for women’s rights, is encouraging moms (and everyone else who actually cares about young minds and thinks the Burger King ad is a hot mess) to speak up and out until the commercials are pulled from the airwaves:

Take Action:

1) Write or call Burger King corporate headquarters. Tell them that unless women are not people, this commercial violates their Corporate Social Responsibility Mission Statement: Fundamental respect for all people, and our planet, guides our corporate conscience. Tell them you will not visit their restaurants until they withdraw the ad.

Burger King Corporation
5505 Blue Lagoon Dr.
Miami, FL 33126
Consumer Relations (305) 378-3535 Staffed M-F, 9am–5pm EST
Email Investor Relations at investor@whopper.com

2) Write or call Nickelodeon, which bills itself as “the only network that puts kids first.” Tell them that to profit by teaching children to objectify women is wrong, and that you will purchase no more SpongeBob merchandise until the offensive ad stops running.

Nickelodeon
1515 Broadway
New York, NY 10036
(212) 258-6000

3) Forward this action alert to a friend.

Don’t have time to write a letter or make a call? Simply hop on over to the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood and sign their online petition. It’ll take two seconds. I’m going to sign mine with my kids when they get home from school today.

You might consider doing the same.