Medium Golden Brown - Jennifer Miller

I am a virgin…for those who know me and know I have 2 children I am not equating myself to Mother Mary.  I am a hair virgin.  I wavered the storms of the 80s and 90s without so much as a crimper, perm, or dye job to touch my hair.  (The hole in the ozone above 15802 Singapore Lane is completely on me. I never shied away from aerosol and aqua net was a personal favorite...  Those bangs didn’t stand up on their own people.)  Sadly, high school ended any desire for upkeep with my hair.  In college, the trend was all about comfort:  baggy oversized sweatshirts paired with leggings and a cute ponytail was all the rage.  Unfortunately, I never really moved past the super casual / pony tail phase of college.  Once I had children I adopted the:  “jimmy crack corn” philosophy for dress code and style.   There just wasn’t enough energy or effort after chasing preschoolers all day to manage an actual hair do.  Doug has gently helped me out throughout the years.  Birthdays, Christmases, and other holidays always find a pretty wrapped package with jewelry, a shirt, or some fashionable piece of clothing.   Fast forward to last week and I found myself with a literal wild hair.  My natural red hair is fading to nothing…literally – no color.  Red hair does not grey – it just fades. 

Despite my introverted personality to keep to routines and avoid change, I threw caution to the wind and decided to trek out to buy myself some hair dye.  Five total minutes of google research had made me a pro as to what product at Target would be best for my skin tone and hair type.  (Have I mentioned that I am WAAAYYY too cheap to go to the salon for color? Also, the commitment level of going to a salon every 6-8 weeks for maintenance would wreak havoc on my current twice a year hair cut schedule.)  Doug was super concerned about my thoughts of dying my wild hairs, but went along for moral support.  He is so precious – he wants for me even more than I want for myself – and I also think he went along for the entertainment.  He was trying to help me avoid becoming either a Muppet or Ronald McDonald.  There is living on the edge and then there is living over the edge.  The line is fine and he was there to help me stay on the path.  In order to avoid the Muppet/Ronald McDonald debacle, I decided I wanted a complete change and would choose a brown hair dye.  42 years as a red head was long enough.  So there we stood in the hair product aisle at Target… Whoa… we both stood there for several minutes taking it all in.  There are A LOT of products that accomplish coloring your hair.  (Ms. Clairol in the beauty section needs to go chat with Mr. McCormick in the grocery section – he accomplishes dying all foods with 4 small bottles of food dye – he has learned the art of keeping it simple.)  We started picking up boxes.  I got tickled hearing Doug read aloud, “This one says it leaves the hair soft” … “This one says best for fine hair” and finally the piece de resistance “This one has golden highlights”.  Boom – WINNER!  It was called “medium golden brown”.  I bought two boxes just in case. 

Before ...

During...

We drove home and somehow I convinced Doug to apply the product.  I donned a trash sack and applied chap stick around my hair line – because Google told me this would keep my skin from turning the color of the dye.  The procedure began in a flurry.  The bottles of dye were mixed and the application began.  There was no looking back – and I was already planning my new fun life of being a brunette.  The directions indicated that once applied, the hair color must stay on for 10 minutes.  I set a timer and when the ding went off I was super excited.  I began to rinse off the color and kept asking Doug, “How does it look?”  He was mostly silent.  He gave a few encouraging statements but since I know him I could tell this wasn’t all good news.   

...After

When the color was rinsed out and the conditioner was applied and rinsed I shot to the mirror ready to behold the change…only to see the exact same color as my hair has always been.  Ok…maybe it was one single tiny shade darker –but not really.  I decided maybe the color would warm up after it was dried.  Nope.  Maybe it would take a few minutes to settle in…nope.  Maybe I was just too close to the process and my kids/family/friends would notice – nope, nope, and nope.  On the up-tick,  I did not look like a Muppet or Ronald McDonald…but boy that was quite a process of time, energy, and effort to walk away unchanged.  I decided that even Clairol knows I don’t need to live on the edge and have packed away the extra box of hair color.  

After ALL of that – and after a really good laugh with Doug, I realized that this is a lesson on how many of my quiet times and dare I say Sunday mornings go with time spent with God.  I put in time, energy, and effort to be with the Lord.  It is not a lack of desire – or lack of study.  I open my Bible – I read His words to me and I talk to Him.  The time spent with Him is tangible… but I listen to hear…not to comprehend or change …I don’t let the words sink into my heart where real change occurs.  When it is all said and done…how many times do I walk away from time spent with Him unchanged- my daily actions shockingly look the same as before.  Oh, that I would continually seek to be changed and colored by Him who loves so perfectly.     

“What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me—practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.”    Philippians 4:9

“But be doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving yourselves.”    James 1:22