Winter Hair

Welcome to winter.

No, I'm not fixing you with a death stare. This look says "Every year this cold weather poop takes me by surprise. Why the hell do I live at this latitude?"

Technically, it won't be winter until late December, but it sure feels like it now. So I went out and got "winter hair." Translated, this means "told my stylist to go dark because when I look in the mirror at the light hair, it gives me the false impression that I'm somewhere warm and sunny." The great thing about paying someone a lot of money to color your hair is that it comes with a complimentary blowout. Which is my real motivation for posting this--oh wait!--is the the glare of winter is upsetting you? I'll post a happy face.

Is that better?

As I was saying... My real motivation in posting these pictures--this straight, smooth, shiny hair thing is something of an anomaly. I never dry my hair straight. I'm not ethically opposed to straight hair or anything; I just never became handy with a blow dryer. Other things always seemed more important and less tedious.

It's not that I couldn't dry my hair properly if I tried. With the right product, tools and technique, and a heckuva lot more patience than I actually have, I could likely reproduce this look. I'm handy with my hands--I sketch, water paint, play the piano (though I am sorely out of practice), and type with my fingers on all the right keys. I know how to use power tools. I have built tables and theatrical set pieces and other random stuff. I also give a fabulous massage. But drying my hair? Eh.

I've always been a wash 'n' go kinda girl. There have been many phases of my life during which I lived out of a backpack. Packing a blowdryer was never on the priority list. I'm also not a big fan of waking up any earlier than necessary--and drying properly takes time. Time that I would rather spend sleeping. Or soaking in the bathtub. Or dreaming up my next excursion that requires nothing but a backpack.

In the end, winter hair is like winter itself: fascinating when it's novel; nice to photograph; quick to grow tiresome. In a few weeks, I'll be dying to highlight my hair honey blond and get on the next plane heading south.