New year, new hair?

I’ve been very fortunate this past year, at a time when many people saw major changes to their health, financial security or the daily schedule their lives revolve around. I am thankful that those things held steady for me, for the most part.

It seems like eons since the break of 2020, and yet like it was just yesterday. I stayed up New Year’s Eve last year, more by accident than on purpose, as is usually the case when I am up past 10 p.m.

I happened to take a selfie, since the entire internet decided they should post a picture of themselves at the beginning of the decade vs. the end. I never did post anything of the sort, but I took the picture anyway.

Looking back at the picture, the only thing that changed since the beginning of the year, is my hair.

Not long before the end of 2019, I had gone in for a haircut, something that tends to happen about one time every other year. I’m glad I snuck that in before everything closed, because anything even resembling art is not my strong suit.

Sometime in the early part of the year, I bought henna and indigo, to attempt a more natural version of the at-home hair dye.

Skip ahead to the end of March, and I finally had the time on my hands to actually attempt the color job.

It took HOURS. Ugh.

The preparation first required that you know you are going to have some hours to spare, hours in advance, since the henna powder needed to sit in tea for at least a couple hours before it could be applied to the hair. I don’t have a crystal ball, so it was a difficult decision when to mix everything up.

I also made the decision to follow the package directions, which had me apply the henna mixture and let it sit in my hair for a few hours, then do the indigo separately. The directions I found on the internet instructed viewers to mix henna and indigo together, and apply both at once.

While there is no guarantee the internet directions would have yielded a desirable result, it would have taken less time. After the mixture sat for however long it needed to, I put the mixture in my hair.

It was about the consistency of mud. Mud seems to saturate surfaces you don’t want it to fairly easily, so I was not prepared for how long it would take to get the thick paste in my hair and covering every strand. It took about two hours. Then, it had to sit in my hair for two or three hours.

By the time the henna sat in my hair that long, I was ready to wash it out. That took nearly an hour longer.

Since I did the henna layer first, separate from the indigo, I had bright orangish-red hair until I could apply the indigo layer. It was three days later, before I figured I would have the time to do that. I didn’t love the bright hue.

I thought, maybe, since I was practiced with the henna, that the indigo would go better. It really didn’t. Also, the mixture was slightly runnier, so it made an even bigger mess to clean up.

Better yet, upon washing the indigo out, I discovered I had missed a small section of hair with the henna. So, while most of my hair was a chestnut brown (which was darker than I wanted, but I still liked), there was one teal stripe down the side.

After over 10 hours of work, I can honestly say it was not worth it. Doing the henna and indigo together may have made the process go better, but I don’t feel the need to dye my hair again enough to find out.

At least it grew out fairly well, so this year’s New Year’s picture won’t look horrible.