Cheap Momma Goes Blonde

Last night, I colored my hair. It's true. In fact, I've been coloring my own hair for years. As a semi-trained and totally unlicensed beauty school dropout, I feel completely confident in my ability to dye my hair one shade darker than my natural color. Completely confident. Sorta.

The great thing about doing your own hair is that it requires no appointment, no babysitter, and most importantly it only costs me around ten bucks. And we all know that cheap equals happy in my twisted little universe. Luckily for me, my hair usually turns out just fine, but like I said, I'm a partially trained, cosmetologist.

However, many years ago, before all my training (wink, wink), I made a fatal hair mistake. I woke up one morning and decided I wanted to be a blonde. Because it is totally normal to wake up and want to change your hair from dark brown to blonde. Of course, even then I was way too cheap to go to a salon for a color job like that, so I recruited a friend and together we set off to the beauty supply store.

A few hours later, as we stared at our new reflections in the mirror with pretend smiles on our faces we began to second guess our little adventure.

"Do you like it," I asked.

"Love it." She smiled. "You?"

"Absolutely. It is just what I wanted," I lied through my teeth.

We both looked ridiculous. My hair, now a lovely shade of burnt orange, felt much more like straw than the silky texture I was used to. But, the next day I set out on a mission of denial. I would convince myself and everyone around me that I loved my new hair more than I loved chocolate, more than I loved Pepsi, even more than I loved a good sale on laundry soap.

I immediately posted a picture of my fabulous new hair color on my blog, telling my readers, which at that point consisted of a few other relatives, that I absolutely loved my new color. I called it carmel blonde. I raved about how it totally suited my skin tone. How it brightened up my complexion. How I was basically born to wear this lovely shade of hair.

Everyone played along with my little fantasy, praising my color, agreeing with my outright lies. All was well in my delusional little world.

I woke up the next morning, walked by the bathroom mirror and had a small urge to break it. At that point, I decided it was time to give up the dream. I pulled my hair back into a ponytail, threw on a baseball cap, and drove to the nearest store where I purchased dye that would put my hair back to its original condition, all the while praying that I wouldn't see anyone I knew.

So each time I consider going a shade or ten lighter, I must calmly remind myself that not all blondes have more fun.