18 October 2012

Hair Today

I will now admit that I am obsessed with my hair.  I don't have great hair, but I have always been obsessed with it.  Which is one thing if I had long, lustrous locks.  But I have fine, s-t-r-a-i-g-h-t hair.  Always have.  When I was a little girl, my mother - whose hair was so thick she used to get it cut because when it started got grow after a couple of weeks went by since a haircut, it was so heavy that it hurt her neck, used to give me home permanents, after which I would look like a fuzzy poodle for about a week, until my hair returned to its usual state.  I never had long hair until I was old enough to take care of my own hair, and it didn't take me long to accept the fact that my hair would never be what I longed for it to be.

So, my hair and I started to get along better.  But if you don't have short hair, you cannot possibly know how hard it is to get a nice short haircut.  Most stylists don't really know how to cut and style short hair, and some won't because they are afraid it looks "too mannish."  I have had two stylists that I thought were great during my entire adult life.  One moved to Florida.   The other quit working when she had her second kid.

Anyhoo, for my entire life up to about age 30, I was a natural blonde.  I would often get highlights over the summer, because I liked the way they looked.  But when I would find people to cut my hair short, it was a waste of $$ to get highlights, since my hair grows quickly.

Then, my light blonde hair started getting darker and ashy.  Then I started getting gray hair.  Pretty, shiny gray hair.  Which made the not-gray hair look extremely dull and dirty.  Now, I've gotta say, if my hair was mostly gray or all gray, that would be fine with me.  But the in-between dirty-looking hair is driving me crazy.

So, I found a stylist that I went to about 4 weeks ago, and she cut my hair in a reasonable, if not perfect fashion.   But she seems very willing to experiment, and when I mentioned that I wouldn't mind coloring my hair, but didn't want weird roots when it grew out, she had me talk to a colorist there.  The colorist suggested a really pretty shade of light auburn, and said that the roots would probably not even really show up.  I figure it's worth a try, you know?

But here's what really amuses me.  The colorist said to me, "It won't be the same red hair you had growing up" etc.  I mentioned that I had blonde hair growing up, and she said, "But you have the coloring of a redhead!"  I was repeating this story to a co-worker, and she said, "Do you mean your natural hair color isn't red?"

So, besides all of the other issues I've had with my hair over the years, now it has an identity crisis!  I have an appointment for another hair cut and color in a couple of weeks, so we'll see what happens ... 

No comments: