Growing Pains…

“I’m never going to turn 18! I want to turn 18! I NEED to turn 18!” and then WHAM. I turned 18 and it didn’t feel anything different to when I was 17! (Okay I confess, it removed the stress caused by bouncers asking me for ID when going out to clubs). I started driving lessons, I became a legal voter and I signed my own paperwork at the bank. I was just enjoying 18 when suddenly 19 came around, before I knew it I was 20 and just yesterday someone told me I was 22!

Who put Father’s Time’s clock in fast-forward?! Somebody stop the clock!

This morning I jumped out of bed thinking that once again I was going to be late for school, it was only 20 seconds later with the toothbrush in my mouth that I realised that I was a taxpayer for almost four years already. I didn’t know whether to sigh with relief that the studying cramming days were over or to groan that I had another day of work ahead of me. Some days, I’d give anything to be back in Mr Carlitz´s maths class… yeah I’d be bored but at least I’d be doing something more constructive, like writing in my diary or passing notes to my friends. When finally consoled by the fact that at least now I wear a more flattering uniform than I wore at school… I choked on my toothbrush. I looked closer to the mirror as it became clearer to my vision. I saw it… I couldn’t believe it! With my naked eyes I discovered the most horrid thing a woman can discover since eyebrow plucking… a white hair!

A white hair on a 22-year-old head is a crime of nature!

Analyzing the criminal from every angle, I came to the conclusion that it simply did not look good on my head! Told not to pull it, as more will grow out, my comb spent an extra fifteen minutes trying to hide it under all the other young and healthy Loreal washed members. Tears threatened to fall as I realised that I would turn grey at an early age and I pictured my near future as no longer being mistaken for a 16-year-old child and rather a 61-year-old granny! Was I being punished for something horrible I’d done? Perhaps I’d been hexed into growing old quickly! Mother Nature was having her fun at my expense!

People that smoke are prone to cancer. Perhaps the white hair that recently decided to sprout on my head is a direct consequence of my actions. My parents used to tell me that I caused the white hairs on their heads when I behaved badly; I conclude from this that stress is a direct cause! No one warned me when I bought the apartment that along with a forty year loan I’d have pay the additional price of a few white hairs. After considering all the stress inflicting factors of my life, it occurred to me that I could sue a few people for this natural disaster! I’m not sure how much I’d win from the case but I’d make sure that a lifetime’s supply of hair dye was in the damage debt! Making a list of who to sue was easy; deciding who inflicted more stress so that I could name my white hair after him/her was the hard part. But after much deliberation, I decided that my boss was the person that recently had most rattled my coconut and was most likely to condemn me to a loony bin. So I sadly took another look in the mirror and named my new bleached friend George!

In a desperate attempt to make me feel better, one of my colleagues suggested that George was a symbol of my advanced maturity. Yeah right sister! If that were true, a lot of people I know would reach 90 with thick black hair! Besides, if that were the price to pay for being mentally mature, surely I’d find more than just one of the offending hairs on my head!

It dawned on me the reasons to why hair dye was such a moneymaking product and once again I was reduced to tears that at my tender age I’d have to begin worrying about such things. Imagining myself bent over a bath tub with gloves and submitting myself to colour torture, I promised myself that no matter how bad it gets I’d dye my hair white before I’d ever have to dye out the white… that way, I know I’d have a “modern” look and I wouldn’t have to worry about dye stains in my bathroom. It’s not that bad! I’d look like Storm in the X-Men! We’ll just ignore the fact that she was a mutant.

Realising that worrying would only make the situation worse I marched to the bathroom to have a one on one talk with George! Unless he wanted to get pulled out, he was to stay under the darker pigmented hairs and bring no relatives with him! I forbade him to appear in the presence of cute guys or to rub off on any of his fellow companions. And after spelling out these rules, I walked out the bathroom feeling much better about the whole thing.

I’m not fooling myself, I know that age and time will plot against me and give George the strength to raise mutiny and a whole nation of followers removing the colour from the blanket on my shoulders. However, my soul and spirit is the one thing Mother Nature can’t get a hold of and as long as I can keep those eternally young, the physical change won’t change who I am.

… But just to be safe, I’ll be investing just a little more on my hair products this month!