Swept from the corners of my mind…
It may be difficult to imagine if you have only seen my current photo, but I used to enjoy fun accessories.
I would wear funky or mismatched earrings, saying, “If you can’t have fun with your ears, what can you have fun with?” I wore fancy felt hats while driving a beat up old green Ford farmer half ton, and wearing my Shining Jersey Mumu of Many Colours or my glow-in-the-dark neon pink cable knit sweater gave me extra smiles.
Before Covid, I liked to dye my hair colours like eggplant or Gleaming Chestnut. Whenever the colour faded or roots appeared I would wander down the pharmacy aisle and pick my next colour splash. Colour of any type was fun!
When I was in university I had a professional put what I now know as “frosting” in my hair. A friend had it and I thought it looked sophisticated. Unfortunately, the hairdresser interpreted my description of “little bits of blonde all over your head” as a complete roots-to-tips bleach with a brown wash over it. Think Marilyn Monroe-esque.
I was unable to speak for an hour after I put my glasses back on. Although I snagged my husband during this blonde phase, I had to re-dye fairly quickly—I didn’t recognize myself in mirrors or walking past windows and the resulting nausea was intense.
Keeping blonde off the list, I continued to colour my hair sporadically. Red was a favourite– Rich, deep, vibrant red. One day, years after the blonde incident, I was alone at home and decided it was again time to dye my shoulder-length mouse-brown locks. Home was a tiny old house trailer on the farm, decorated with polka-dotted curtains, a wall of gold-laced mirror tiles, and light colours, all in the hope of making it look bigger. The miniscule bathroom fixtures were that medium blue that screamed “The Seventies Were Here!” and even the gleaming white shower curtain sprinkled with multicoloured polka dots could not change how small that room looked.
The tiny blue sink was too awkward to stand by and splash water to rinse the solution out of my hair. The dye was set and there were red lines around the edges of my hairline under the frothy white cap of foam. I undressed and took the single step to the freshly-scrubbed blue tub, pulling back the big curtain while turning on the water.
When I wet the solution on my head, watching frothy red streaks flow down my arms, I noted that I would have to re-clean the shower when I was done. Then I started to slip. I fell, desperately grabbing whatever was around me in an attempt to stay upright. Faucet, curtain, wall, all were grasped at and lost. In a breathless moment I fell out of the shower through the shower curtain, ripping the rod off the wall. My head barely missed the blue toilet and I lay wedged between the toilet and cabinet for a few minutes staring at the ceiling.
Slowly I realized that there were tiny splashes of red dye on the ceiling. My eyes travelled to the walls where drops and trails of red were slowly sliding toward the floor. The fall had flung drops to every corner of the room. I lay still, legs still part-way in the tub, shower curtain tangled about me so I had an arm imprisoned, a red puddle under my head, grateful I was only winded, not hurt. Then I had to giggle.
There was no way to avoid it, I was going to have to clean the shower AND the room. Or maybe I could find a forensic team to tidy up for me, after all, it looked like a scene from CSI!
Yes, there is an excitement in colouring my hair that I kind of miss, but that was more fun than I’m meant to have.
Cathy Bendle finds humor in the quirks of everyday life, from training teachers to dodging housework. When not writing, she’s either laughing at her pets, frantically Googling for her work assignments, or playing on her iPad. Her column appears every other Wednesday.
