Dye Another Day

I glanced at myself in the mirror, and tilted my head up and to the left, a scoff plastered to my face.

"What? What is it?" the man asked from the bathroom doorway.

"It's my hair, it's gotten all dully," I replied, a disgusted tone in the back of my voice. "I think I'm going to dye it again, all dark and sultry." I shimmied my shoulders and pushed past him through the door. Definitely a good decision, I reassured myself. It was true, my hair had gotten "dully." It wasn't at all shimmery, and had no defining hue at all. As a matter of fact, it was getting dangerously close to my natural hair colour - a mousy light-brown. Mennonite brown.

"What are you talking about? It looks fine! It's not dull, it's pretty!" The man insisted from the hallway, while I busied myself gathering what I'd need for my shift at work. "It's sort of summery, in a way, really. I like it."

"Well I don't, it's got to change. I can't afford to go to the salon, though, I can hardly afford my ruffles chip addiction as it is. I'm going to stop by Wal Mart on my way home and pick up a box of something chestnutty."

"If that's what you want to do, then that's fine. I'm sure Kit or Chels could dye it for you." His voice was uncertain, my friends were always so busy. Neither of us were sure I'd be able to get one of the girls to come down and dye my hair before the wedding I planned to attend in a couple of days. Still, it had to be done somehow, even if I had to do it myself.

That afternoon I found "Cappuccino" on the second lowest shelf in the health and beauty department. Garnier Nutrisse Cream seemed pretty dependable, and the girl on the box seemed quite satisfied with her own hair colouring outcome. I bought two boxes, however, since I've got quite a bit of area to cover on this head of mine. I headed home.

"Guess what you get to do tonight?" I said, feigning excitement, as the man shot me a skeptical look. He could read me like a children's book.

"What..." His eyes narrowed, and his hands rested on his hips as a devious smile spread across my face.

"I couldn't find anyone to dye my hair, so you get to do the honours! Doesn't it sound like fun? It'll be easy, I've done it a thousand times!" I sounded pretty sure of myself, given my extensive acting experience, but he seemed completely unconvinced and a wave of panic spread over his face.

"Oh no, absolutely not! There is no way I'm doing that! That's waaaaay too big a deal, if it doesn't turn out..." He began scratching his scalp frantically, going over the consequences in his mind. "No, no, no. Not going to happen, you'll have to do it yourself."

"Nooo! I need you, bud! I can't see it in the back, and I'll never be able to tell if I got the roots!" After a few more minutes of pleading he finally agreed, under the pretenses that he would not be held responsible should the outcome be less than desirable. Agreed.

The evening finally came and he followed me fearfully into the bathroom where I roosted in my most ugly of clothes on a stool in the middle of the room. He picked at the box with his fingertips, a specialist in the beginnings of difusing a bomb. He carefully lifted the three components out of the cardboard, and pulled the made-for-women latex gloves over his fingers. "Great, this is a good start," he grumbled, realizing the gloves barely reached his wrists, and his fingers were now webbed. "You can still back out," he warned. "I haven't ruined anything yet."

"Nonsense!" I proclaimed confidently. How hard can it be?

We mixed the components and began the science experiment on my head. I instructed him to cover the roots first, and then work his way down to the tips. I told him each hair had to be fully penetrated with the solution, and anything left dry would stay light. As I rambled on about the procedure, his eyes widened and the pressure threatened to break him. But, he soldiered on.

He squeezed the bottle slowly over the part in my hai...

"What are you doing?!"
"What? What?? I haven't done anything yet!"
"You're doing it way too slowly! That's not nearly enough to penetrate the roots! You've got to squeeze more!"
"But I don't want it to run ou..."
"Don't worry about that! There are two boxes! This isn't that hard."

He squeezed more solution over my hair. He gently patted it down into my scalp and...

"What are you doing?! What are you doing?!"
"I'm rubbing it in like you said!"
"You've got to do it more quickly, and harder! You're not painting my hair, you're supposed to be soaking my hair!"

He rolled his eyes, grumbled again, and continued. He squeezed an abundance of solution over a section of hair, and frantically, forcefully, rubbed it in. Good, this was the way. He was learning, slowly but surely. This would be done in no time!

The man got through half my head before I got so fed up I had to put on the second pair of latex gloves and do some hands-on assisting. The partnership actually worked for a while, despite the fact that the concept of not-dying my face never really got through to him. In the end I turned out looking very badly beaten around my hair line, and like I had some sort of circulation problem in my extremely purple ears. But the job was finished, two boxes later, and the man could finally relax. For 25 minutes. The results would dictate his fate in the end.

I stepped into the shower and rinsed the solution out, carelessly spraying red-purple dye all over the white tiles and cream-coloured shower curtain. Suddenly I found myself in a scene from Psycho, and began frantically collecting water in my hands and flinging it onto the walls. I did manage to rescue the bathroom, that is to say, everything but the giant purple smear across the bathroom door. This little souvenier was only discovered hours later, and will be a badge of honour for years to come I'm sure.

I blowdried my hair, and emerged from the steamy laboratory into the living room where a very nervous hair stylist sat, awaiting his doom.

"It turned out!" I shrieked triumphantly. He lept from the couch and lifted his arms in victory, and we danced around the room in our glorious success.

"Don't you ever make me do that again!"
"But you did such a great job..."
"No, absolutely not. Out of the question."

And after we ooed and awed over my delicious new hair colour, we paused and looked each other for a moment of silence.

In memory of those who dyed today.

One

You knew who you were meant to be,
But soon enough you'll come to see,
That you you thought you knew before,
Doesn't know you anymore.

Where everybody knows your name

What exactly is it about drinking that brings people together? All it takes is one drink, and you could befriend any person in the entire room. You don't even have to be drunk, you don't even really have to be tipsy, just a drink and everything that normally races through your head in a new or scary situation just melts away.

"Won't I seem stupid? I'm not pretty enough to talk to that guy. She definitely won't like me. I can't sing on stage, I probably picked a stupid song. They'll laugh at me. I won't be able to hit the notes, the music is too loud..."

None of that matters. And suddenly this person is introducing themself TO you, and not the other way around. And then you're introducing your friend to their friend, and at the end of the night everybody knows everybody, and it becomes one giant personal party, in everyone's honour. All because of a drink.

What an exceptionally new learning experience. Just another page in the story, I suppose.

Two halves don't make a whole

I've been away for a while. One can't really blog while they're away, but I was certainly without question "away." It's a strange thing, being away. Stranger still when you don't know you've been, or that you need to return at any point. But I have. And I was.

A sort of overwhelming realization hit me a couple of weeks ago, that terrified me to my very core. I looked at my life, at my relationships, at how I spent my time, and I had absolutely no idea who I was. I sat down and talked to the man, and he said he knew what I meant. We realized we only spent time with our friends when we absolutely could not spend time with each other. I realized that I've stopped painting regularly, I've stopped writing short stories, I can't even get around the city on my own without his car, or his instruction with buses. AND if I were to have a car to get around in, I wouldn't even know how to put gas in it. I've been dependent, and it's so scary.

So we decided to take a break from being a couple. Not a break-up, and not one of those typical breaks that couples take. We were still pleasant with each other, just stopped hugging, kissing, OBSESSING over one another. We forced ourselves to spend time apart. And I don't know if we've ever done anything so intelligent in our entire lives.

Within the first few days, even, I found myself with a much greater sense of individuality and independence. In the first week, I took the bus completely by myself, made a new friend, went out to a karaoke bar and sang karaoke in front of a room full of strangers! I've signed up for a hip hop dance class, I've gotten a $150 parking ticket, I sketched! What a world!

And through it all, and all of our independence and time apart it struck me harder than ever how much I loved the man, and how he was without question the one God wanted for me. I've never really felt that all encompassing feeling before, that nod from above that says "Okay, it is now safe to proceed." God told me I'd made the right decision, and I've never been happier.

The man and I have reunited on a much healthier level, we can have comfortable conversations without fighting over how we made each other sad today, we can bring ourselves happiness without each other, I'm still going out and making new friends, and he's still making time for his friends, and going to school regularly, and investing in himself.

It's really as if before we were two halves, and when we came together we made a whole. Our ignorance led us to believe that this was a healthy way to be, that love means needing someone. We were absolutely and completely wrong! In our time apart we've learned what it means to be a whole person on your own, and by coming together we are so much greater than anything we've ever been. I adore myself! I love the adventures I've been going on, the risks I've been taking, that exercises that have been stretching me far beyond my comfort zone into a strange and exciting world.

Hello, we've never met before.
I'm Holly, and it's wonderful to meet you.

Big Love

The man and I have been completely immersed in this television series lately, on the ledge of obsessed. We saw a couple of episodes on late night HBO over a couple of days, and decided we absolutely needed to see all of it! So we got a hold of the first season and we've been watching through it. I adore it! And I really don't know what the allure is, but I'm just so fascinated by all things having to do with the show!

The series "Big Love" is based around a family of Polygamists in the wholesome state of Utah. One man, played by Bill Paxton, is married to three women, Jeanne Tripplehorn, Chloë Sevigny and Ginnifer Goodwin, and together with their children try to make it through every day life. The three women have very diverse personalities and traits, and very different contributions to the family. Basically, this family overcomes the obstacles involved with living a secret life, while trying to run a business, as well as deal with their dark Mormon background and live a pure and decent life free of the stereotypes that polygamy carries with it.


It's so amazing, I am just crazy about it! Don't get me wrong here, people, I'm not getting ready to convert or anything like that, but it's just so darn interesting. And the actors are just so incredible, and so funny and completely different from what I'm used to seeing. And while watching you're exposed to a lot of basic christian principles as well, and strong family values, which you really don't see a lot of on television anymore.

If you're scanning through the channels and you see it, I definitely suggest you give it the time of day because I am just thoroughly enjoying every second of it!