Purple
Many people think I’m crazy when it comes to the color purple. No, not the movie - the color itself. It’s my favorite color, and I figure that if you’re given a choice between colors, you should go with the one that makes you happiest. Therefore, I tend to have quite a bit of purple things in my general vicinity. Sometimes I’m caught by surprise when someone mentions one of these purple things around me, simply because it’s fallen under my purple radar.
Of course, a lot of these people who think I’m crazy about purple knew me when I had purple hair.
All of my life (well, at least since junior high), I’ve wanted to dye my hair some color. Living in West Texas, that wasn’t about to happen anytime soon. I moved out to San Francisco, but by then I was in the workforce, and the higher-ups frowned upon that sort of thing since I was working in a brokerage. One day, I finally became fed up with listening to the same screaming people, so I started looking for a new job.
A friend of mine who had left the brokerage was now working at another company, at this point called heaven. He passed along my resume, I was interviewed and given an offer. Immediately after accepting it, the gears in my head started turning.
You see, this place is one of those software companies you hear about that loves their employees. they let us bring in our dogs, the dress code is “clothes” and the atmosphere is extremely laid-back. I did the addition in my head (carry the five, drop the remainder) and I realized that I could finally dye my hair!
Being the paranoid worry-wart I am, I sent my friend several emails making sure it would be cool with the higher-ups. He reassured me that it would be cool, so I opened up Photoshop and started trying on new hair:
- Green: Okay, depending on the shade. It’s a little over-used and it can look really gross when it starts to fade out.
- Bright Red: I love the color, but three words always pop into my mind when I see it: “Bozo the Clown”.
- Blue: “Little Old Lady”.
- Orange: Interesting, but I don’t wear orange very well.
- Safety Yellow: See “Orange”.
- Pink: See “Green”.
- Purple: Purple. My favorite color. Not used much (at that time). Looks good on me. Oh yeah.
So purple it is. I went the safe route, buying the Manic Panic and heading for the local hairdresser for the bleach and color. This was the next-to-last day of work at my old job. I spend my time under the dryer and come out looking at the mirror with one thought on my mind:
“Little Old Lady.”
This theoretical purple was actually more blue than anything. Oh well, I knew it was supposed to be purple, and in my heart, that’s what it was.
So I hop in the truck and take off down the road, listening to the local jazz station’s “Girl from Ipanema” marathon at full blast. What a punk rocker. Not to mention that the DJ had scored just about every version possible. I was driving through the middle of the French set.
So the sun rises on the last day I’ll work at my old job. I wander in early, because I’ve brought a camera to catch people’s reactions as they see me. Not only did I use my hair to thumb my nose at the dress code (it sounds easy until you try it), I arrived in jeans, sneakers and t-shirt. What a rebel, huh?
You know how to make sure your name is remembered on the first day of a new job? You probably know but I’ll tell you anyway - show up with purple hair.
By this time, the color was already wearing off (because Manic Panic sucks), so my ex-wife and I had re-dyed my hair at home. Doing the self-dye thing is pretty interesting - if you need to know why, look around your house. Find an easily accessible faucet under which you can conveniently stick your head face-up without spraying bluish-purple rain everywhere.
So here I am, leaning over the bathtub, trying not to fall in as I rinse my head under the faucet. As the water runs down my head and I see purple pooling above me (relatively speaking), I begin to realize that I haven’t quite thought this all the way through. I also realize that my knees feel quite comfy, since they’re resting on our plush white bath rug.
Uh oh.
With this thought in mind, I turn on the shower and lift my head with a complete disregard of physics, namely that little ditty about things that go up coming down. The purple river that had originally appeared to be flowing upward was now most definitely travelling in a downward direction and quite rapidly at that. It was then that I ran into my next problem.
Have you ever tried to open a shower curtain with your eyes closed?
Add to that an ever-increasing panic as you realize that with each failed entry attempt, you’re putting a head-shaped spot of purple on the once pristine curtain.
Once I finally got in the shower and stopped panicking (about halfway through), everything went pretty smoothly. Manic Panic washes off of your body, bathroom tiles and bathtub rather quickly and painlessly. This is probably why it doesn’t last that long in my hair. In fact, by the time I got around to opening my eyes, the shower was relatively purple-free.
Unfortunately, this dye job only lasted a week as well. Upset with the lack of staying power, I went on a quest for something better. I found a dye that was the exact shade of deep purple I was looking for. The name on the bottle said “Punky Colors”.
And I thought I made a mess with the Manic Panic.
You know how in a horror movie, the cop will come up on a crime scene and say “It looks like someone slaughtered a pig in here”? Imagine a purple pig being slaughtered. Slowly.
The bathtub was purple. The tiles were purple. The walls were purple. The shower curtain was purple. I think I even saw some purple on the ceiling. Not to mention my hands, fingernails, shoulders, back, legs, feet…
You know, I don’t think you’ve truly lived until you’ve seen yourself with a purple butt.
After a half gallon of bleach, a bottle of rubbing alcohol, two sponges, three washcloths and an interesting chat with the seven dwarfs who each came in to chat with me, everything was back to normal. Well almost. The bathroom looked good and the parts of me that you could see looked fine, but near the end I was getting a little woozy and Dopey and I had a falling out, so I only cleaned the parts of me that showed. Except for my, butt, which was the first thing I de-purplized. That’s all I needed was people wandering around singing “Blue Moon”.
I will say this though: Punky Colors lasts.
When you dye your hair a strange color, you find that you’re running into things you hadn’t even thought of before. When’s the last time you were embarassed because you walked into a store and someone else had the same color hair as you did? How many times have you had people come up and say “you really shouldn’t wear that color of shirt - it clashes with your hair”? It’s also a little eerie to find purple hairs on your sairbrush and in the shower drain. The nice thing? If you’re eating something and find a hair in your food, you instantly know if it’s yours.
I really enjoyed my time as a purple freak. I like purple to start with, and I think I look pretty good in the color. Something about having purple hair makes me think better as well. Don’t ask me, ’cause I don’t understand either. If I still had purple hair, I could probably think of why that is.
So why am I no longer purple? Well, my “look” tends to be the lowest common denominator between what looks good on me and how easy it is to maintain. Keeping your hair purple is a huge pain in the butt. Add to that the fact that it would be harder to maintain now that I have shorter hair, and that I’m seeing more and more people with purple hair. Yes, it might be awhile before I go back to my natural purple state, but I had fun while it lasted.
