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March 01, 2007 9:27 AM- again with the cabbages!

When it comes to hair, there are two sides to my family: my dad had a full head of silver hair before he was 30; my mom had gorgeous, dark hair well into her late 50s with nary a gray hair on her head until her early 60s.

Although she resembles my dad, my oldest sister is blessed with my mom?s hair gene. Our next oldest sister got the short end of the DNA straw and went silver at 30 much to her chagrin. Me? I?ve been something of a ?tweener.?

Still, when those first silver strands showed up in my early 30s I went straight to the colorist and have been coloring my hair ever since-- and hating it. Really, I hate having my hair colored because it makes me feel like a fake. However, the battle between feeling fake or going prematurely gray was never much of a struggle?I quickly got used to the fake and, in fact, for a time there, quite enjoyed it.

Quelle surprise--my superficial nature often wins out over my more philosophical leanings . . .

The last couple of years, though, I really wanted to stop outright. Yet I knew in my corporate job I couldn?t grow my hair in gray. You think I?m crazy? I?m not. I would?ve lost power immediately. I?m not really going to go into the reasons why and wherefore here?I accept that you may disagree with me, but I will not budge on this belief?I would?ve lost power and so I kept coloring my hair.

Then, last summer I changed jobs. I now no longer worked in the corporate sector where airbrushed image is key to success. In my new job as a program director for a non-profit arts organization, I could cut loose and dress like a new age shaman on holiday in Iceland?nobody would blink an eye?creativity and personal expression is where it?s at.

So since September, I have been actively working my brain around this shift, how to let it all go and not self-destruct in the ungainly process (and the hard-core acknowledgement that my wild youth has passed) because let?s be honest here, there is gonna be a whole lotta ugly before we get to anything remotely acceptable.

For the past 6 weeks I have been growing out my roots and in a couple of weeks I go in to get my hair stripped?and then for the next 12 months?well, who knows. I?ll keep you posted on all that. Mostly? I am SO looking forward to summer where I can be in the lake and ocean and at the beach and let the sun do its magic on my hair?something I haven?t been able to do for all these years as when your hair is colored the sun is to be avoided.

The truth is, I am genuinely excited about this change and am all "bring it, bitch!"

So, why am I going on about all of this? This morning, as we sat around the kitchen island eating pancakes and chatting with some houseguests up visiting for some skiing and whatnot, I came across this article in the New York Times and it kind flipped me back a bit. I mean, this is the first time I have ever seen the argument for plastic surgery and botox and the like being compared to orthodontia and who?s ever going to argue against the value of orthodontia? Not me. And yet, I absolutely reject the notion that botox and plastic surgery is more attractive than wrinkles and natural aging.

Categorically, I reject it.

I?ve seen both up close and personal and I am repulsed by plastic surgery, botox and the like. It?s horrifying to me in the same way 17th century French court with its pox and powders would have freaked me out--humans as monsters, as far as I?m concerned. (See: Joan Rivers, et al). But am I just out of touch as this article implies? Will my gray hair and wrinkles someday be looked on as yellowed, crooked teeth are today?

Perhaps this is simply clever marketing and they?ve set up an oranges and apples comparison between orthodontia and plastic surgery. Who knows.

My guess is that it?s all some freaking fear of death. That, and an obsession with false imagery that we get fed on a daily basis through film, tv and magazines.

Either way?you?ll always be able to pick me out of the crowd?silver haired, boobs at my belly, ass at my ankles?and and a shit-eating grin amid that masses of wrinkles. Because Death can come and find me any day of the week it wants to, I'm not going to play some kind of elaborate masquerade to try and outwit it (as if Death can't see through botox, I mean come on, people!). No, I have always resonated most deeply with Montaigne who wrote, "when Death finds me let it find me planting cabbages, as unconcerned about Death as I am about the cabbages I'm leaving behind."*

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*Now that's just me rendering my own translation-- go read it for yourself if you want a better version.

got 2 cents?



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dodo says:
i hate hate hate hate my clumpy grey roots and regularly get what P calls "the special paint to make you hair more blacker"
posted on: March 01

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alison says:
delurking to say that i just finished reading that article before i came to your blog and i love your response! "and a shit-eating grin amid the masses of wrinkles..." possibly the best thing i've read in months!
posted on: March 01

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Claire says:
Uncanny that you've posted this today. This morning as I was snipping out yet another pure white hair that had sprung up in the midst of my brunette barnet, I wondered how long I could keep this up before being left with no hair. I'm 31 in a month, I'm not ready for this! But I don't want to "have" to dye my hair. It's no fun if it's not for fun. I was thinking let it all go white then be a platinum blonde?
posted on: March 01

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lizardek says:
I totally believe you when you say you would have lost power in corporate America if you'd let yourself go grey. What a shame, though. I'm glad that you feel you can be yourself in so many ways since your job switch last year. How fulfilling!! And you know what? If you discover a year from now that really, you don't like the grey? You can just color it up again! Voila!
posted on: March 01

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bp says:
lizardek-- exactly! I can always go RED! and Claire I think platinum blonde would be a gas-- go for it
posted on: March 01

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Jecca says:
I 100% believe and agree with you that going gray in trad. corp. America would have meant not only loss of power, but the end of your career. My mom started going gray at 26 and I don't remember her without all-gray hair. I started getting a few "sparklies," as my hairdresser calls them (isn't that great?!), a few years ago (in my late 20s). I'd been growing in my natural color after years of dying my hair for fun and shock value, but immediately decided to start coloring my hair again to cover the grays. I've thought about how to grow in the gray, too, when I decide to do so, and was wondering if letting it grow in in streaks would work. That is, keep coloring pieces of it, but just decrease those pieces over time. I'm not there yet (and really don't have too many sparklies yet either), but I have thought about it. Oh, and out here in Southern California, I only know of one woman under the age of 75 who has gray or white hair. It just doesn't exist.
posted on: March 01

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Jecca says:
to keep overcommenting: p.s. So many plastic surgery people look so freaky around the eyes! All folded in at the lower eyelids and like scary evil zombie dolls!
posted on: March 01

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Joy says:
Somehow in reading this I kept thinking of New Orleans... Seems like natural and being who you are is right at home there.
posted on: March 01

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Meg says:
I'm with you BP. Botox definitely makes women look like they have plastic faces (see Real Housewives of Orange County). This, of course, matches their plastic souls. It's horrifying and unnatural. Hollyweird is responsible. I blame them... as I do for most everything else.
posted on: March 01

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Tami says:
I recall years ago, Joyce Meyer stating in one of her sermons that she had had plastic surgery. She said it is no different than getting braces on your teeth. I think she made this analogy just to show people how orthodontics IS a type of surgery which changes the features God gave us. Many Christians argue that we shouldn?t change what God has given us, yet braces never come to mind. I think it is a great comparison. Personally, I don?t have a problem with it. Good luck with your hair!
posted on: March 01

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Milly says:
I pluck my strands of white hairs, luckily most of them are hidden underneath layers of hair, but often times they pop up, especially when I have no tweezers to remove them.
posted on: March 01

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Sam says:
Yay you! I think grey/white/silver manes are so beautiful. And I don't think we should cut our hair shorter as we get older, unless of course we like it - what's wrong with an older woman with long, grey/white/silver hair? I don't know what I'll do when my grey threads appear - I can barely get myself to the hairdresser now as it is, and my hair is plain dark brown. As for plastic surgery - while I will admit to fantasizing a lovely fat-sucking procedure around my thighs, I am all for wrinkles. They are beautiful! So I will be with you, lovely and wrinkled and not looking like we were too afraid to grow up, to face our mortality. We shall be natural and beautiful! Hear ye! Hear ye!
posted on: March 01

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fw sunshine says:
I'm a big believer in doing what makes one happy. Unfortunately, a good many people - especially women - let society dictate what should make them happy. Thus, the botoxed, stiff faces, plastic boobs, and various other things that make women look less than human and certainly less than themselves. Personally, I think that women who are proud of themselves and comfortable in their skin(s) are the most beautiful. (Why would a 60 year old woman want to look - or BE - 20?) Case in point - Helen Mirren at the Oscars. She looked her age - and more fabulous, beautiful and sexy than any other woman there. By leaps and bounds.
posted on: March 01

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gracia says:
I love that I will now be able to pick you out in a crowd. see ya, g
posted on: March 02

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Buffy says:
What do new age shamans on holiday in Iceland dress like?
posted on: March 02

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Meg says:
I'm with you BP. Botox definitely makes women look like they have plastic faces (see Real Housewives of Orange County). This, of course, matches their plastic souls. It's horrifying and unnatural. Hollyweird is responsible. I blame them... as I do for most everything else.
posted on: March 02

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Jazz says:
I blogged a few months ago about the comments I got when I decided to let my hair go grey again. It was bizarre, everything from you'll look like a freak to you're so brave. Um... brave? I'm not going to Iraq, people. Hello! This cult of youth we have is scary. Even if you sand your face down to the bones, you'll still be 45 or 50 or 75. Why is it wrong to look your age? I work in a really rich area of town and the botoxed, lifted, abraded ladies who lunch that I see every day are scary. And funny enough, they still look their age. Or worse, since the work inevitably shows, they look their age and they look scared. Not that I want to get old, but I'm never ever gonna go the botox and facelift root. Hell, i've never had orthodontia either. OK. rant over.
posted on: March 02

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Heather says:
Oh yes! Okay, well, I still colour my hair, but that's because it has blonde and red streaks as well as my natural (well, not quite all natural anymore) brown. However, I'm still tweezing like mad the grey eyebrows. Botox, however - yuck! I'll just have fuschia hair and wrinkles when I'm 80.
posted on: March 02

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catherine says:
I definitely in the anti-plastic/pro-gray crowd...my hair has been coming in silver, it's pretty wild, first the hairs go from dark brown to coppery to silver...as if the color is simply fading away, so no gray roots per se, entire single hairs in silver...I'm all for it, I refuse to pluck them out or color it. I'm with Jazz "Why is it wrong to look your age?" I totally agree...I say turn off reality tv, don't look at Cosmo and instead rejoice in the fact we're the ages we are, whatever they may be, hell - we're only here once. So, yea for you BP and good luck with your transformation! :)
posted on: March 02

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