Sometimes,Your Girls Are the Family You Get to Choose - A Review of Wash Day Diaries and the Beauty of Female Friendship

 

I just finished Wash Day Diaries, and I think what I loved most about it was how ordinary everything felt.

There is no huge mystery to solve. No complicated plot that keeps you turning pages because you desperately need to know what happens next. Instead, we get four young Black women- Kim, Tanisha, Davene, and Cookie...living their everyday lives in the Bronx, dealing with relationships, family, work, personal struggles, hair, and, most importantly, each other.

And somehow, that was enough to keep me reading.

Wash Day Diaries by Jamila Rowser and Robyn Smith is a collection of five connected short comic stories about four best friends. The title comes from something that many Black women will immediately understand: wash day. That day when washing and taking care of your hair somehow becomes a whole event. You need time. You need products. You need patience. And sometimes, you need your girls.

But while the book is literally about hair, it is really about so much more. It is about what happens when women create a little family of their own.

What I loved about this story was how naturally it showed the different things women can be going through at the same time, even when they are sitting right beside each other laughing and doing their hair.

Because sometimes you can be having the best time with your friends while secretly dealing with something that nobody knows about.

And I think the book captured that beautifully.

Kim, Tanisha, Davene, and Cookie are all different. They have their own personalities, their own problems, their own ways of dealing with life, and their friendship does not magically erase any of those problems. Instead, they simply show up for one another.

And honestly, there is something so beautiful about that.

We talk so much about romantic relationships in stories. We talk about finding the one, falling in love, heartbreak, marriage and all of that. But Wash Day Diaries reminded me that there is another kind of love that deserves just as much attention: the love between women who have decided that they will not let each other go through life alone.

I loved seeing how friendship can become a safe place.

You know that friend you can call when you don't even know how to explain what is wrong? The one who will listen to the entire story, even when you've told it three times already? The one who knows when you need advice and when you simply need somebody to sit beside you and say, "Girl, I understand"?

That is the kind of friendship I felt in this book.

And I really like when girls don't have to be perfect friends all the time. They have their own lives. They disagree. They have moments where they don't completely understand each other. They are not always dealing with their problems in the best way. But underneath all of that is this feeling that they will still come back to each other.

Because real friendship isn't always about agreeing with someone or being available every second. Sometimes it is simply knowing that when life gets messy, there are people you can turn to.

And the girls in this book have that.

They have their own little girl family.

I think that is one of the biggest things I took from Wash Day Diaries: having women who show up for you is a blessing.

There is something special about being surrounded by women who can see you at your most ordinary. Not dressed up. Not performing. Not pretending that everything is fine.

Just you.

Maybe you're tired. Maybe your relationship is stressing you. Maybe you're having problems with your family. Maybe you're questioning something about yourself. Maybe you simply need to sit down, eat something, laugh until your stomach hurts, and forget about your problems for a few hours.

And your girls are there.

Sometimes the support doesn't even come in the form of some deep conversation. Sometimes it is doing someone's hair. Sitting in a salon. Sharing food. Talking nonsense. Giving advice nobody asked for. Laughing about something incredibly stupid.

And I think that is what makes the book so warm.

It understands that care doesn't always look dramatic.

Sometimes care looks like helping your friend with her hair.

Sometimes it looks like listening to her complain for the hundredth time.

Sometimes it looks like giving her a reality check.

Sometimes it looks like simply showing up.

And speaking of the hair, I really loved the way hair was used throughout the stories.

The hair isn't just decoration. It becomes part of the women's lives and their relationships. Wash day becomes this space where they can slow down, talk, reconnect, and take care of themselves and one another.

I also loved the fact that the stories are about Black women simply living.

They aren't introduced only through suffering.

They are funny. They are messy. They are stylish. They are annoying sometimes. They are loving. They have dreams. They have bad days. They have good days.

They are allowed to just exist.

And that was beautiful to me.

The artwork also deserves its own little appreciation because this is a graphic novel, and the illustrations add so much to the experience. The different colour palettes help create the mood of each story, and there is something really satisfying about seeing the characters' expressions and little moments play out visually.

There were moments when I would just stop and look at a page because it was so pretty🥹.

But beyond the pretty illustrations, I think what made the book work for me was how relatable it felt.

You don't have to be a Black woman living in the Bronx to understand the friendship at the centre of this story.

You understand what it means to have people.

You understand what it means to be going through something and have a friend say, "Come over."

You understand the comfort of being around people who know you well enough that you don't have to explain every little thing.

And maybe that's why I enjoyed it so much.

It made me think about female friendships in a way that felt very gentle. We all have different things going on behind the scenes. One friend might be struggling with a relationship while another is dealing with family issues. Someone else might be questioning herself, while another is simply trying to keep everything together.

And yet, they can all sit in the same room, laugh, talk, eat, do their hair and remind one another that they are not alone.

That is such a simple thing.

But it is also such a big thing.

I also appreciated the humour. There are moments that are genuinely funny, and I loved how the book could move from something serious to something light without feeling forced. That's also how real friendships work. You can be crying about your life one minute and five minutes later, one of your friends says something so ridiculous that everybody starts laughing.

Life is strange like that.

You can be carrying something heavy and still find reasons to laugh.

And I think Wash Day Diaries understands that Black joy does not mean Black women never experience pain. It means that even with the difficult things, there is still room for laughter, friendship, beauty, rest and love.

There is still room to enjoy your life.

There is still room to sit down with your girls and say, "Okay, enough about that. Come, let's eat."

And perhaps that is why this little collection of stories stayed with me.

It reminded me that the people around us can make difficult seasons a little easier. That friendship takes effort. That showing up matters. That sometimes the family we choose can become just as important as the family we were born into.

And it made me appreciate the women in my own life a little more.

The ones who check in.

The ones who listen.

The ones who make me laugh.

The ones who will let me rant and still be there afterwards.

The ones who know that sometimes I don't need a solution. I just need somebody to say, "I'm here."

My rating: 4.5/5 ⭐️

If you enjoy graphic novels, stories about friendship, Black girlhood and womanhood, or simply want something warm, funny and easy to get through, I think you should pick this one up.

And if you're someone who loves stories where the ordinary moments are the story, Wash Day Diaries might be exactly what you need.