Saturday, February 11, 2012

Gray, silver, or white?


I found these on Pinterest a while ago. I'd love my hair to be long enough to braid like this (my goal is to look like an aging hippie), and I'd love to have the guts to color my (gray? silver? white? colorless?) hair this way. Isn't it awesome? Anyhow, this is a post about hair color and the things kids say.

Four times in one day. I swear.
My first graders were working intently on self-portraits, using mirrors and drawing with big pencils. In each class (there are 3 first grade classes) someone started coloring in his hair with the pencil. I reminded him/her that "We will be adding color to the drawings in our next art class, and besides, coloring with that pencil makes your hair look gray. The only person with gray hair in this room is me." (Actually I think my hair is silvery, but I also insist my gray car is silver.)

And in each class, the student responded "But Mrs. Brown, your hair isn't gray; it's white!"
So that made three times.

The fourth time came later that day. A 6th grade boy stopped in for some help gluing together a chariot he'd made for a social studies project. I was asking him about the horse figurine he'd used, as it reminded me of one in a collection I had as a kid. It was a palomino like this:

He responded "I know why you like it so much, Mrs. B! It's tail is white, exactly like your hair!"
So that makes four.

There was a time when my hair looked like this, and everyone said it was black. It was dark, very dark brown, but it was NOT black.
Oops, actually that's Art Teacher Barbie's hair, though it's the same colo that mine was in the early '70's, when the pics below were taken. I French-braided Barbie's hair recently. I decided that the flight-attendant style pony tail had to go. I'm still working on improving her clothing though.

So here's my college era hippie-hair (excuse the photo quality; they are scans of tiny photos):

8 comments:

  1. I know it's time to go get my hair colored when my students tell me" I think there is chalk in your hair..." or the "why is your hair white down the center Mrs.C?" I always wonder when it will be time to let it all go gray but I'm not there yet.(I've been going gray since my mid twenties)It used to be very long also. I only recently got it cut short. (like just under my ears short) Left work with it long one day and came in the next day with a complete new look! Everyone kept doing double takes! I love it and from everyone's reactions they do too! Change is good!

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  2. Dye it with kool-aid for the last day of school!

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  3. I second that! In fact, Phyl, I double dog dare you to dye it for the last day of school! I bet the newspaper would cover THAT story!:)

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  4. I'd say that retiring with multi-colored, rainbow hair would definitely be considered "going out with a BANG!!"
    ps. My short, white hair used to be long and very dark brown, too (decades ago)!!!

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  5. Sigh. I"d LOVE to do this for the last day of school. I actually died a hot pink chunk in my hair a couple of years ago when my good friend "C" was going through chemo. She's the gal whose head I painted with henna - I posted about it a few times, including here: http://plbrown.blogspot.com/2010/07/always-bright-side.html

    Problem is, the following Monday I'll be going somewhere that I will blog about soon, having to do with a professional job opportunity. I have to think about whether the rainbow hair will be a big detriment at that time.

    But I'll consider it!

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  6. I don't know what it is but everytime I write a comment it gets stuck or lost in cyber space. . . here goes! I love it the way it is! Let me know if you change it though so I can spot you in NY. I won't be able to miss you if you tie dye it though!

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  7. Nobody knows what color to call my hair either. It used to be strawberry blonde but is reddish now. Not that "red" hair is actually red, more orange. But it looks different in different light, whether it's up or down. I just know I mix lots of colors when I do self portraits. I would say yours is silver because that's more fun, and probably more accurate than white or gray. :)

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  8. It is so funny to me that kids notice what we don't care for them to necessarily notice and don't notice what we want them to really see! I'll never forget once that I went to the trouble and spent good money to have my hair highlighted. When I got to work the next day a kid asked if I had tie dyed my hair. Then once I decided to cover the gray with blonde I now get asked why I have a dark streak in the middle of my head. :+)

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