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Illustration by Catherine Chan
I’ve just set the alarm. In 45 minutes, something magical will happen. I will be restored to the woman with the long hair – so dark, it’s almost black.
I’ve always had good hair. When I say good, I mean that it’s so many of the things people say they want in their hair. It’s strong, it’s not too curly or too straight, it’s not greasy, it’s not dry and it’s thick. It’s so thick that it can’t be left unsupervised in humidity.
While my hair has most often done what it’s told, it has one really rebellious streak. And that streak comes in the colour grey.
I first noticed a few grey hairs here and there in my 20s. In those days, regular highlights were enough to conceal and to confuse. But as the years wore on, it seems the greys have gathered strength. They are not strands any more, they are encampments on my scalp. The sparkle used to reveal itself every couple of months. Then that shrunk to six weeks, and now it’s three. Every time I see the glint, I’m inexplicably surprised. Every time, I’m annoyed. Every time, I lean in closely to the mirror, section out my hair and measure out just how soon that dye tube needs to come out.
I had always wanted to keep my natural chestnut brown.
“It just won’t work,” my stylist said. “You need something darker to cover up the greys.”
And so darker I went.
Long before the pandemic, my stylist taught me how to dye my own hair. My hair colour tube reads “4N” or “natural medium brown.” It’s worked for years to cover the grey. But I’ve noticed a distinct lack of co-operation of late. The greys have quietly built a stronger shield as though to tell me the gig is almost up. Here and there, the “natural medium brown” glints a bit, like a spinning disco ball.
I’ve wondered, why do I bother? This hair dye ritual is a lot of work! I cannot stop the march of time. It should not matter that my hair is going grey.
This is not an essay about shame in age. There is no shame in age. It changes you in too many ways to mention and some of those changes are wonderful. I’ve found it to be a process of shedding old skins that kept me corseted. I feel as though I breathe more deeply, and the exhale makes all my words the gentler for it. My horse no longer feels the need to run a race with no end.
If each one of my greys is a battle I’ve fought, well, I’ve done my fair share. And so, one day, I asked my stylist, “What do you think about my going grey?”
“I think you’d look great,” he said. “But you’ve missed the window.”
“What window?”
“The pandemic,” he said.
“Going grey is messy. You’ll look scraggly for a good bit of it. It won’t be pretty. If you want to do it, let’s do it. But it’s a commitment. With long hair, it will take a long time. Years. Think about it.”
I did think. I thought right through the five tubes of 4N I had in the drawer. And then I thought through a couple more. I’d like to tell you I didn’t buy another dozen tubes. But I did.
So here we are. The three-hour start-to-finish home hair dye ritual is in full swing. And when that dye sinks as far as the shields permit, my hair will once again be “natural medium brown” from root to tip, more or less.
When I’ve washed out the dye and blown dry my hair, I will examine the strands that frame my face and the wisps that hang loosely around my ears, hoping that my amateur hands brushed on just enough dye in all the right places to eliminate the grey once more.
While I clean the dye bowl, the hair clips and the comb and put everything back in the cupboard, I will once again wonder why I don’t just give up this resistance, why I don’t just let time have its way.
What age does give you is a good number of realizations. One – I don’t care how my birth certificate counts my years and I’m grateful to have always looked younger than I am. Two – People judge. It’s just how people order their world. What matters is, if it matters to you. Three – People only do things when they want to, when they see the value in it.
I don’t want to give up my thick dark head of hair. Just like I don’t want to give up sugar or cheese or a good whisky. I’ll go grey when I’m good and ready. You do you. I’ll do me. Now let me check how many dye tubes I have left.
Beatrice Politi lives in Toronto.