What to blahg about? What to blahg about?
Y’all’d be totally bored with today’s work rabbit holes. So what do I have? Often if I wait long enough, something will come up. Today it came up via my friend Margaret who was questioned on instagram about her childhood blonde hair.
I had light blonde hair as a child. When I approached adolescence, it darkened into what some people call “dishwater blonde”. Googling that term, yes, that’s what my hair did. By the time I had little blonde toddlers, people sometimes (rudely) asked me how my kids ended up with blonde hair when mine was clearly not (not). In the first place, DNA is extremely complicated and there are kids everywhere who do not have their mother’s hair color (not to mention adopted children…). I happened to marry a man with a similar hair color to mine and I guess those genes predominated. The GG really really really wanted a red-headed child like his beautiful sister Susie but as much as I loved Susie, I somehow knew that wouldn’t happen for us and it didn’t. Blonde and blonde.
There are some people who are born light blonde and stay that way into adulthood. My [late] MacMu cousin Cathy was one of them. Beautiful platinum white hair her whole life. I miss her and the natural platinum hair I may have been envious of when I was a teenager and my hair was darkening. Cousins on both sides (Fin and MacMU) have varying hair color though. We are a beautiful mixed bag.
Whenever I got asked that (rude) question, I would always respond with something like, “This *is* blonde hair. It’s just *old* blonde hair.” In time my beach urchins’ hair darkened in a similar manner to mine. They are still beautiful! And, circle coming back again, now that my hair is mostly white/gray, I almost look like a blonde again if you aren’t scrutinizing me too closely 🙃.
Oh the pic. My childhood bedroom. I am in 1st grade (I think) and working on art stuff at the Yellow Table, painting or something, I’m not sure what. All of my clothing is hung up on that rod there next to me. There were several shelves above that to hold various things, I don’t remember what at the moment. Behind me is my new fancy bed. You can’t see the silver headboard. Our house was just a shabby little bungalow but I don’t have bad memories of it at all. It was clean and I had my own space and The Commander did her best to make it comfortable for me and my brother.
P.S. I musta been in 2nd grade because I think that yellow thing on the bed is Medicine Duck, who I got when they took out my tonsils and 2nd grade is when that happened because I kept getting strep infections one after the other. I stopped getting sick after that and I still have that old friend.
May 7th, 2019 at 7:20 pm
She is still cute.
May 7th, 2019 at 7:23 pm
He is actually saying “KW is still cute”. 🙂 <3
May 7th, 2019 at 7:30 pm
She *is* still cute! And grandma was good at making things comfortable.
May 7th, 2019 at 8:17 pm
That photo could be me; I stayed blonde for most of my childhood (white blond as a youngster), then it darkened in high school to a dishwater blond/light brown. In college it went very dark, perhaps because I was no longer working outside in the berry fields of Puyallup, Washington. Of my two girls, Alison had the white blond hair that darkened in high school, whereas Ashley has always had chestnut brown hair. Hair and eye color are interesting things.
May 7th, 2019 at 8:40 pm
I sort of remember where your room was, and I seem to remember Jim’s room being at the top of the stairs. And your parents beyond … the kitchen and the dining room (with the piano?) at the back, and a small living room up front.
May 7th, 2019 at 8:40 pm
Mostly I remember blowing up plastic ski-doo models with firecrackers in the back yard.
May 9th, 2019 at 2:39 pm
I, too, had white-blonde hair until I was about 7 years old. (Then, dishwater blondish/brown). It was a meh color, and in junior high/high school I colored it a little darker. At that time, everyone I knew who dyed their hair blonde looked brassy and unappealing to me. But after high school, hair dyes improved and I started gradually lightening my hair (without brassiness), until I eventually maintained a platinum color that I had my first 7 years of life. A hair stylist once told me that we tend to identify ourselves with the hair color we had as young children. This makes sense to me! I still color my hair, but mostly just to even out the gray and white to achieve a more consistent blend. I don’t want to be gray, but white (with a hint of blondish) is OK!