Bad hair days

Yesterday with the help of friend Lynn, I set about "doing my roots" (this may be one of those expressions that doesn't travel well, e.g. to Australia). Actually, I merely sat still and Lynn did them; I am not methodical enough to produce an acceptable result or to avoid dyeing my ears in the process, and she is.

I had unmistakeably grey roots in my currently mid-brown hair. Mid-brown was not the shade I chose when I decided to bypass the hairdresser. The box said "Light Golden Brown" - a shade that might not show the grey too distinctly as it emerged at its usual alarming rate. Wrong! There was a crisp borderline of brown and grey. Should have gone lighter. 

Why bother? you might ask. I sometimes ask the same myself. Such vanity. I am fine with my wrinkles, crow's feet, the evident power of gravity, the crepey neck (well, less fine with that one, but I'm growing resigned), but going grey gracefully is something I can't find it in myself to embrace. I have very dark eyebrows, and a serious, somewhat grumpy face (a lifelong affliction; don't let it fool you!) and ending up as a photofit version of Alistair Darling and Gordon Brown is just too much to risk. 

Why not let my hairdresser do it? is another good question. Well, I'm looking for a new hairdresser, and not from one of those salons that turn out endless young blonde clones who are happy to spend a months' wages on their highlights and to endure three hours of top-volume chit-chat over the blasting music. 

I thought I had found the ideal hairdresser last year, fairly local, a somewhat older, slightly arty-eccentric woman, who is an excellent colourist, but although she doesn't ask me if I'm doing anything nice tonight (yes, putting my slippers on and sitting down in a quiet room) or where I'm going on holiday this year (nowhere - my holiday fund is being spent on getting my hair done), she does pour out, in graphic detail, her considerable personal problems. 

And when she's finished with those, she tells me all about the personal problems of her exquisitely made-up trainee, who disregards her advice to ditch his violent boyfriend. Sometimes it's more than I can face, to sit through this catalogue of woes;  they are then recounted to the next customer while my hair colour develops, so I get to endure them twice. I don't fall into the advice/counselling trap - I know others do, although they are never listened to - and I emerge with great, natural-looking hair colour, but feeling emotionally wrung out, and wondering if perhaps I should have been charging her for the listening session. 

Who thought that fighting Nature - expensively too - would be so challenging? The price of vanity, it seems to me, is a complex and sometimes punishing combination of elements, not all of which appear on the till receipt. So it was time to take economy measures while attempting to thwart Nature's cruel way with my hair: home dyeing....

And yes, tonight I will be doing something nice, I'm sure. In slippers, true, but without reference to holiday brochures or more intimately-detailed information about other people's personal lives than I need to know.

Hmmmm....vain and callous - perhaps I deserve that grey hair!