September 9, 2008
Purple Hair
My beautiful, talented Daughter has the coolest hair. It has been purple for several years and now she has her beautiful blond tresses shading from deep purple to turquoise. I actually love her hair in shades of purple the best —for some reason it just suits her and her effervescent personality! When she was a teen, I would allow her to “dye” her hair for special costume occasions. I was probably hoping that if I allowed her to do this “rebellious” thing that it would keep her from doing something really harmful. Besides it was fun – for all of us! I think it worked because she is a fabulous, successful young woman who has made a positive name for herself in the LA tech community.
And so she has given me the “recipe” for safe, non-toxic, non-permanent cheap coloring of your hair. Use Kool-aid! Yes, I said Kool-aid! The stuff you used to drink as a child; some of you still drink it. The TV ad with the big pitcher with the happy face on it! Here we go…..
First and foremost, you must only purchase the sugar-less or the kind where you add your own sugar (which you do not add). Reason? You do not want sugar on your head because the flies, bees and bugs will also want to be there! Mountain berry punch is suggested as the color of choice because it evidently gives good coverage, but you are limited only by your own imagination! You mix it in a small amount of conditioner – enough to make a paste- and apply it to your clean hair — as a colored conditioner. You may want to use gloves to protect your manicure! You may need to mix in three or more packages depending on how thick your hair is and how deep you want the color and how light your hair color is to begin with. Then pile your hair on top of your head, cover with saran wrap and wait at least 1 hour. The timing depends on hair length, texture, amount of Kool-aid, etc. You can clean up any mess you made during this time. The longer you leave it on, the longer the color has to penetrate the hair shaft and the deeper the color will be. Gently rinse the excess conditioner out and dry your hair as usual. You can also color just the ends of your hair, or a section of it; the whole idea is to have fun and be creative! Rainbows anyone??
When you are tired of your fun hair color you simply shampoo it. You may need to shampoo your hair two or three times to get all the kool-aid color out, but hey, what fun you had!!! This blogher is not responsible for any inacuaracies or mishaps!!! But, let us know how it went!
Crystallizing Thoughts
I have always been a women able to envision the possibilities not only of life, but also of homes. And so every house that I have lived in has allowed me to make changes that created a warm loving home. My move to PDX is no different; and the house I purchased was bought with many changes in mind. This last six weeks found some of those changes actually being done! Renovations are never easy — of the house or of our hearts–but hopefully all are better after all the deconstruction and reconstruction! I will say that my house improvements provided an unexpected means to personal renovation, if you will, that was totally unexpected and unsought. It came gradually through the conversations with the contractor over the weeks. A strong, solid Christian man, he & I shared thoughts on where we are in our lives today. His observations caused me to look into past hurts deeper than I have wanted to for the last three years. I guess those bitter Midwest winters had changed this Sunny California girl into a stoic American Gothic farmwife who just didn’t want to face the aching pain any more. I preferred to just go on day to day, keep aloof and not deal with everything from the past. And actually not even moving on –just existing emotionally. Keeping only “safe” (family) loves in my heart…ones that couldn’t hurt me too much. Pushing away, avoiding the prospect of, and not even wanting to allow another to get close. Unable in many ways to really get out of the deep depression of long stress even while putting up a very good front not only for others, but myself.
Anyway, as our conversations slowly evolved over the weeks, I began to realize specific qualities that I needed to see in a man. Prior to this, I had vague ideas of some of the desirable qualities I wanted to see, but mostly I knew what I didn’t want to see in a man. I was able to make the distinctions that crystallized things in my own mind. There is a big difference in knowing what you don’t want and knowing what you do want. The difference is staggering to me. And so, not only did the external house that I live in get changed, but my most personal house , where my life is truly lived, was changed also. Crystal is said to be stronger and clearer if it goes through fire, is cooled, then is fired again and so on. I am still going through the firing process and today nothing is “crystal clear” to me except that I have a long way to go.
