About the Gray

I posted a new profile pic on Facebook yesterday

and a friend whom I hadn't seen in person in a long time messaged me to ask if I was coloring my hair again.  Not accusatory, just curious.  But now I feel the need to explain.  Because if you've been reading this blog you might remember that I made kind of a big deal out of growing out my gray hair last year.  And you all were and have been very supportive.  So here's the deal.

I did grow out the gray hair.  All of it.  It took about a year.  The sides were almost totally white, which I loved.  And I think a lot about growing those back out.  But the rest of my hair wasn't silvery white.  It was a pretty dull brown, streaked with gray.  Sometimes I was okay with this.  Sometimes I even felt fierce about it, like I was doing something pretty badass.

But honestly there were quite a few bad days, too, days where the Voice of Shite really had his way with me.  I would not sleep well or be stressed out and the dark circles would be bad under the eyes or my skin would feel particularly sallow or I'd notice other signs of wear and tear on my body, and then also my hair would look dull and--even though I know it's a cultural construction and not terribly feminist or brave--I would feel old.  Where the white was coming in around my face, especially, my hair looked thin and I felt pretty washed out.

I noticed that I started to refer to myself as old.  I also noticed other weird social hiccups, as in we would go out with new friends and I would feel the need to explain away or apologize for my gray hair, right off the bat, and to just casually mention that I was 40.  In case they were thinking that I might be 60, I guess?  It was like having a cosmetology version of Tourette's.

[Clearly there was something else going on here, some other deep-seated insecurities about making new friends in a new city, occupying my new position of "authority" or "seniority" at work, turning 40, that manifested in an obsession with markers of age and trying to figure out where I fit in the larger system of women's identities.]

So on the bad days I was feeling and even acting some cartoon version of "old."  Very often I could talk myself out of these feelings because 1) I don't like how we think about "old," generally speaking, especially when it comes to women, 2) most of the time I think I still looked pretty good [confirmed by looking back at pics of that time], and I was aware that I obsessed about my hair/appearance much more than anyone else did, 3) lots of gray haired women I know are super sexy and confident, and why shouldn't I be too, and 4) it was a practice of self acceptance that frankly I was craving and still crave.

Alas, the dull days started to win.  I found I was thinking about the hair more than I was not thinking about it, and I had grown the gray out so I could think about my appearance less.  I talked to my stylist and she put some low-lights in my hair, just to give it a bit more definition.  I liked how it looked.  I felt better.  I felt a lot better.

But then, you know, I was getting low-lights every six weeks.  And I correlated these little touch ups with feeling better.

So then, you know, why not just start coloring again.

I texted my gray-goddess friend N. and whined to her for the umpteenth time about having a bad gray hair day and she finally had had it with me and essentially said, color it, don't color it, who cares?

Right.  Who cares.  Perspective.

Went back to the stylist, said let's do it, and she took me back to a pretty tasteful brown with highlights, thank you very much.

But at some point I won't keep coloring.  At some point I'll get tired of the monthly appointments or  cost or I won't like how the color looks anymore and that will be that.

Here's what I will say:  The value of that experiment was that I found out that something I thought I had to do--coloring--wasn't compulsory after all.  I can make a different choice any time.  And it was a good lesson in accepting something about my looks I wasn't always happy with.  When the gray starts to peek through now it just doesn't feel like a big deal, although for the moment I am happy to go and get them colored over, too.  It wasn't easy, but doing this allowed me to break some rules I had for myself, and serves as a reminder that I can break them again, when I'm ready.