Comments on: Gray-haired young ladies

by: Andrea

Fri, 01 Feb 2008 13:52:59 +0000

Meryl Streep, Stacy London, Helen Mirren, Jay Manuel. All have had some gray or white hair, and I kinda want to be all of them. I think gray and white hair looks distinguished, clean, and unabashedly sexy. Though, I’m just a wee one at 20 years old, and still have the natural light brown. I hope my opinion doesn’t change when I start getting grays, but then again, it appears I will be able to avoid it til around 45, based on my parents.

by: TLE

Thu, 31 Jan 2008 21:53:53 +0000

“Is the fear about losing sexual attractiveness REALLY all that strong?”

In my case, I didn’t marry until 39, to a man nine years my junior. I didn’t plan to ever color my hair, but when I developed a “silver lock” at 44, I changed my mind, and have to admit there was an element of fear involved in the decision. At this point, 10 years later, I would probably feel comfortable letting it go gray, (confident that my husband would never leave me over something so trivial), but I like the way it looks; it feels like me when I look in the mirror (I’ve always been a mousy blond, and maintain my natural color). Maybe I’ll wait until I’m sixty…

by: Todd

Thu, 31 Jan 2008 20:50:22 +0000

The universe is 14.5 billion years old. My life span will be about 70+ years, if I stop drinking, which I won’t because I’m getting quite good at it. Besides, the universe is 14.5 billion years old. I’m nothing. You’re nothing. We’re all worm food to be. Nihilism is liberating.

With that in mind, I vote that you shave it all off and go with tattoos.

by: small

Thu, 31 Jan 2008 13:32:28 +0000

THIS IS SO GREAT!

I thought I was alone!

I’ve been attempting to pluck out rouge grey hairs and then recently got my boyfriend to dye them for me (he complains that I am being ridiculous).

But now that I realize I’m not a freak at 26 I feel much better. Esp. since my Mom said she never had grey hairs until she was in her 40s and my grandmother still had mostly brown when she died at 96.

Yay! Thanks!

by: Sumana Harihareswara

Thu, 31 Jan 2008 08:00:06 +0000

Killing time before I head off to work for my first day at a new job! Project management, here I come!

My parents are from India and my hair is naturally black. As in, the shiny shade and texture of black that basically all Asian hair is. I don’t remember when my mom and dad’s hair started changing, but in their early sixties and seventies respectively they’re both salt-and-pepper now. So I can’t expect that my hair will stay uniformly black forever. But dyed black looks duller than natural black. And it would be such a bother to dye, since I’d have to bleach it first. So I find it hard to imagine that I’d want to dye it.

I could see hair change making my job easier or harder. Older = more experienced, more competent, etc., sure. But in the tech industry, there is a perception that older men and women don’t grok the hottest technology fads.

The California Supreme Court will hear Google Co.’s appeal of a discrimination lawsuit filed by a 54-year-old manager who claims he was fired after a supervisor told him his opinions were “too old to matter.”

So I’ll find out in a few decades.

by: Ilana

Thu, 31 Jan 2008 00:30:49 +0000

Here in Durango, Colorado there are a lot of very attractive, athletic, educated older women with beautiful long silvery-gray hair. My husband drools over them. Alas, I’m 44 and have exactly three gray hairs; my parents didn’t go gray until mid-60s so I expect I’ve got a while to go yet. I never thought I’d feel bad about not having gray hair until I saw the way some of these 55-to-65 women look. I’m tempted to dye my hair gray now!

(I think that having long gray hair is a double unconventionality, because it seems that older women are “supposed to” cut their hair short. Maybe that’s the “dangerous rebel” vibe?)

by: mustelid

Wed, 30 Jan 2008 20:27:00 +0000

After over a decade of hair dye, I’m currently trying to get back to my natural color (the novelty has worn off). Now, if I could just figure out exactly what it is…it darkened over time…I do like the grays that have begun to pop up. Literally. Coarse and silver tends to stand out against fine and blonde?/brown?. The silver strands are beginning to recruit in earnest, and I now have a proto-streak forming. I’m impatiently waiting for at least salt-and-pepperdom to commence Manic Panic experiments…

by: june

Wed, 30 Jan 2008 17:57:38 +0000

I dyed my hair for most of my 20s, just for the fun of being blond or redhaired or whatever. I stopped a couple years ago to a) see what my real hair color was (it’s changed quite a bit throughout my life, and b) to see if I had any gray and what it looks like. My grandmother has really cool-looking silver-gray hair and I always thought if I went that kind of gray I wouldn’t want to dye it. Turns out I am a very nice medium-dark brown with quite a few silver hairs (I’m 33), and I don’t plan on dying my hair ever again.

by: pennylane

Wed, 30 Jan 2008 17:43:24 +0000

This feels like a therapy session. I have been slowly greying since college (I’m early 30s now) and I don’t think I will ever dye. I can’t be bothered to shave most of the time and I’ve never worn makeup so any kind of beauty ritual beyond combing my hair is rough for me. That said, I also will never dye it because my mother has dyed her hair for 20 years not because she is bothered by her grey hair but because my father, who is 8 years older than her, thinks her grey hair makes him look older. And that makes me ill.

Also–I’m a prof and I look younger than I am. I think the grey hair probably helps my authority in the classroom.

by: Mark

Wed, 30 Jan 2008 15:51:15 +0000

Waaaay late to this thread, so I don’t know if anybody has mentioned this yet. My wife colors her hair because she says the gray hairs cannot be controlled and coloring makes her hair more managable. We’re both in our forties and she’s not really that vain, but she HATES fighting w/her hair before work.