Oh god, where do I begin? I suppose that little statement reveals quite a bit there making me wonder if I should go all deep and talk about my low self-esteem and how it plagues everything I do and blah, blah, blah….
But seriously do you even care about that? Probably not and just thinking about how people don’t even care is enough to send me to the therapist’s couch. So instead why not go easy and reveal something else I hate about myself that you probably care even less about but for me is easier to write about, at least in an interesting manner I hope. And the big reveal, something I hate about myself?
My hair.
I know. All of you who know me in real life are probably thinking “Is she kidding? I’d kill for her hair!” I’ll admit that I do like the fact that I have lovely thick hair. Look at these locks:
I hate them. Yes it’s thick but do you see the lovely color? It’s not natural. Underneath the golden blond lurks horrid, wiry grey hair. Yes, grey. I am 44 years old and my hair is completely grey. All of it. I hate it.
Unfortunately grey hair runs in my family. My mom had solid grey hair by age 40 as did both grandmothers. My mom and grandmothers simply accepted it, but I’ve been fighting it ever since I found my first grey hair at the age of 14. Yes, 14!!! I spent my teenage years yanking the occasional white hair and thanking god I had plenty of heavy brown hair to spare. By the time I hit 20 I started dying it. Luckily for my bank account my mom is a hairdresser. I spent the 80s and 90s with a rainbow of hair colors: blond, brown, burgundy, red and every possible color combination minked in as well. By 2000 (what do we call that, the 00s?) I settled on one color and have been blond for the past 10 years.
When I was younger I used to think that all the coloring would be temporary. “I won’t do this forever” I’d think staring at myself in the mirror looking like a cheesy 50s style space alien with a billion pieces of foil sticking out of my head. “I’ll go natural when I hit 40. That’s old enough to be grey.” But by the time I hit 40 it was too late. I was sucked in and couldn’t bear to be anything but a blond. It was no longer a desire but a need. And oh, my mom retired years ago so now I have to pay to get this shit done, $140 a pop (that includes tip). Every 4th Saturday is spent with my hairdresser Marian getting my roots touched up. It’s a huge pain in the ass that dictates my life. Last minute social events are major sources of anxiety as I obsess over the white strip on my scalp (like a backwards skunk) which won’t get covered for another 3 days. And god forbid Marian gets sick on the day I’m supposed to go in. I have been known to miss work in order to go to a rescheduled hair appointment. Since I come back the next day with freshly touched up roots I can’t even get away with blaming my absence on dental work or menstrual cramps. It’s humiliating.
Going natural at this point would be painful. First of all I’d have to break the news to Marian. That alone would be traumatizing since at this point she knows me better than my own family and not seeing her every week, sitting in that chair telling her about the past month would be like a giant void. Not only that but she needs me too! She depends on that $140 each month!
In short, I’m addicted and Marian is my dealer.
If I were brave enough to breach the subject of going natural Marian and I would have about a year to get used to things. I’d have to go through a year long ordeal where I’d have to get gradual shades of blond streaks which I would eventually have to grow out. Basically it would be a detox program with Marian as my therapist, which she kind of already is so it might work. But I can’t even think about that now. Maybe when I’m 50.
