FEATURES
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'Speed dating: Six minutes or less to try to find a match'
News & Record | Feb. 14, 2012
GREENSBORO - Call me "Dioni #6." Just a 20-something woman looking for love. Ahead of Valentine's Day, I tried to find a love connection, sans Chuck Woolery, in six minutes or less. I took the challenge of speed dating Feb. 1. Eleven blind dates in about an hour. I put on a silky top, form-fitting jeans and makeup, which I use only about 10 times a year. This was a special occasion.
'Building triumph over tragedy'
News & Record | Dec. 25, 2011
GREENSBORO - Tuesday was the one-month anniversary of a dark day for Robert "Rocky" Smith and his 20-year-old daughter, Christina. "I didn't want to get out of bed," Rocky said, his voice breaking. "I think it's the first day that I felt that way." Authorities say Mary Ann Holder, Rocky's ex-wife and Christina's mother, killed five children and herself on Nov. 20, destroying their family. They don't know why. "It just seems to hit harder when there's a day set on it," Christina said. "Even though all the children didn't die on the 20th, that's just the day that everything changed. We basically knew that day that six people that we loved weren't going to ever be the same. We didn't know if they were going to all pass or not, but that's the day everything went wrong."
'Bitten by the lovebug'
News & Record | March 25, 2011
GREENSBORO - Here comes the bride. All dressed in white. In a neon orange dune buggy. And a blushing Carolyn McHenry - now Mrs. Tim Barnette - couldn't have been happier. On Thursday, she married her boyfriend at their home away from home - Herbie's Place . "I thought, 'What better way to do it?' " she said. "Because we were doing it fun, red-necky, country and pretty all wrapped up in one." This supposedly is the first time the diner that serves breakfast 24 hours has had a wedding on its menu. "We'll put this one down in the history books for sure," the groom said. The 50-year-old bride added: "We decided to do something different, and I guess we did." Tim Barnette, 55 . has been eating at the diner at 3136 Battleground Ave. since 1996. He comes in almost every day, mostly to eat his favorite meal - the Western omelette "with hash browns all the way." "I eat here a lot," he said. "She said, 'If you're gonna stay there, we might as well get married up there.' " The bride's daughter, Kayla Monahan , walked her mother from the dune buggy to her groom as a Rascal Flatts song played: "God bless the broken road that led me straight to you." Both had been married twice before. They met about seven years ago while she was working at a gas station near Herbie's. "She didn't even like me when she first met me," Tim Barnette said. "She said I was too burly. I just wore on her, I guess." After four years, she "finally gave in" and started dating him. He proposed under the diner's yellow Volkswagen called "Herbie's Bug ," the car model they love to talk about at the Volkswagen Club meetings on Thursdays. Some of the club members were among the guests. Carolyn Barnette's friend of more than 30 years, Donna Apple , helped plan the wedding . "It started out kind of as a joke," Apple said. "But the more we started talking about it, it just starting blossoming. And here we are." The bride wore black combat boots underneath her gown. Her groom wore a denim jacket with U.S. Marine patches. Instead of a guest book, they had a "guest rock." Friends and family wrote best wishes with markers on a white sheet covering a rock outside the diner. Monahan made the white and pink two-layer cake. Nearly 50 guests laughed, ate dessert and fawned over the Volkswagen " bugs " in the parking lot and the love bugs who just got hitched. "It's so amazing," Carolyn Barnette said. "I'm so blessed. We're blessed. We've got a wonderful family."
'Good hair' is in the scalp of the beholder
News & Record | Oct. 25, 2009
Most people say that your hair is your crown and glory, and they go to great lengths to ensure that their "glory" is not tarnished or rusty. Black women are no different. I, for one, tried to hold fast to my glory with perms or relaxers that chemically straighten hair. I received my first relaxer at age 9 or 10. Until then, my mother had my hair straightened with a hot comb. But my hot-natured sweats and Mother Nature's humidity deterred any plans to keep my hair soft, long and straight - how " good hair " should be. Every six weeks, I would sit in a hairstylist's chair and let the relaxer sear my scalp until that tingling sensation became an unbearable, Texas Pete burn. But it was worth it - at the time. I could run my fingers through bone-straight hair . I took pride in how my hair lay flat in school photos. My hair changed after I left my native Kinston for the dorms at UNC-Chapel Hill. I didn't have a trusty hairstylist to take care of it or a car to carry me home when my roots became too "nappy." Soon, it began to break off under the stress of taking exams and finding new friends. The summer before my junior year, my scalp had been burned for the last time. July 2007 marked the last time I received a relaxer. I wore my hair in braids until I made the "big chop" in March 2008. Cutting my hair was life-altering. I did not recognize my hair in its natural state. The jet black locks sprang into coils directly from the root. My hair suddenly resembled a Brillo pad, and I didn't like it. The first few months without shoulder-length, relaxed hair left me insecure about my looks. I became well acquainted with scarves and hoods. I sometimes skipped events and could not stand to see my facial features, which were more noticeable, in the mirror. One rainy day on campus without an umbrella made me see the advantages of having natural hair . Other black girls grabbed the nearest plastic bag or newspaper to hold over their heads as they screeched, "My hair!" At that moment, I laughed. Just a few months before, I was them, steadily trying to keep my hair straight and limp to fit another person's ideals of beauty. It is so freeing to keep my hair in its natural state. I find my two-strand twists so beautiful. I am more confident in who I am - nappy hair and all. There is a sisterhood of women with natural locks. It's as if we make up a minority within a minority, so we must edify one another. That support is essential when people stare at your kinks in the mall or a relative tells you to straighten your hair to look more desirable to potential employers or mates. Some do not understand my choice. Some admire my choice but aren't brave enough to don the natural look. I say that I'm not brave enough to burn my scalp again. But all ladies should be brave enough to rock any style of healthy hair that makes them look and feel their best. If you wear a weave, a track or a wig to achieve your idea of " good hair ," so be it. Good hair is in the scalp of the beholder. It's on your head, so you should be proud of it. I'm proud of mine. |