Hair Trouble

A word of wisdom...never dye your hair black after your father has died.
Yup, I know it is wisdom that would seem pretty random and should seem pretty obvious, but I just wanted to let you know.
When my Dad died, my hair was REALLY needing a color job, but with everything that needed to get done for the funeral and such, I went to my Dad's funeral with insanely grey hair and mouse brown roots. Oh well.

I had to change the picture to black and white because the roots were seriously just that bad.
When the company my hubby was working for closed and thus, we weren't moving to Florida, I needed a change. I needed to feel like I had some control over something. So I went to my hair god and got about 8-10 inches cut off my hair.

I should have changed this one into black and white just out of self pride, but I don't think you could truly appreciate how BAD the root and gray situation is unless you see it in color.
Great cut, but the color...the color was still just BAD. I wanted to go dark dark espresso brown with a blue streak. Something fun, funky, and different. However, seeing that the damn company my husband worked for shut down with 2 hours notice through an email with no severance package, I thought it would be mighty irresponsible of me to go spend $120 to get my hair colored. So, that drab, hideous color stayed put.
Fast forward several weeks, while my hubby was training in Las Vegas and I was wandering aimlessly at Super Target, I thought it a great idea to grab a box of hair color and just go for the dark hair. 25 minutes later, I was rinsing "soft black" Nice and Easy out of my hair. (((gulp))) Man that water is running awfully dark. I looked in the mirror, and I appeared to have an oil slick on top of my head! Surely it won't be that bad once I blew it dry and styled it. Yeah, not a chance. It was black....black, black, black. I tried using harsh shampoo and giving it some time to fade, but it just never did.
Once I got to North Carolina, the only thing that changed about the black was that I now had about 1 1/2 inches of mousey brown and gray roots going on. So, trying to be "financially responsible", I decided, I better go to Sally's and get some professional level dye to get the black lifted a bit. I picked out a medium brown, almost a chocolate looking color. Again, fast forward 25 minutes, the color that was rinsing out was glorious. I was so happy to get the black out of my hair! With a blow dry and style later....I saw the black did not budge, at all. My hair was just as black as before...didn't change a bit, well except for the beautiful chocolate brown color my roots were. Now, I looked like a cheetah. Seriously?!?!

Can you even believe the cheetahlicious mess?!?!
After a couple of weeks hiding under hats and wearing ponytails, I conceded, and my Colorado hair god agreed, that the only way to get the black out was to cut it out. Before I had spent the last years and years growing out my hair, I had a fun spiky pixie cut that made me feel fun and funky. That would be the cut I would get! So, I scoured the websites of area salons. Seeing I don't know anyone yet to ask for a good hair person, I was looking for that website that showed that funky cool place to go. I found a place, I called and made an appointment for Saturday. Excitedly, I went to get my haircut. I sat down in the chair, explained what I wanted, and as luck would have it, a lady sat down next to me who had the EXACT hair I wanted. Little did I know, I should have got up out of the chair...my bad. My hair is now insanely short on the sides and back...in fact, my husband's hair might be longer. I think once it grows out a month or so, it will be able to be fixed to what I wanted. Just pisses me off because the EXACT hair I wanted was sitting in the chair next to me....GRRRR! I think my curls freaked her out and instead of using product and blow dry, she just kept cutting. The good news is that the lady who was next to me (you know the hair I was coveting) has the same texture, original color, and curls I do, so I know the cut will work great. She had her hair colored blonde.....blonde, blonde, all over, like platinum blonde. So, I think once this grows out more, that will be the color I go for. It looked fabulous! It made the cut even more fun, plus, as a bonus, it hid her grays really well.
I could get all "after school special" and draw the parallels between my bad hair drama to dealing with grief, demanding control, and desired outcome...but I won't. I am too busy pouting.