The Day I Dyed My Hair Blue

So it’s been two months since I last wrote here. It’s been one of those years.

Exactly two months to the day since my last post, I died my hair blue. Actually, I went to the Bijou salon in Lubbock, and the stylist did an awesome job there.

It’s an interesting thing when you dye your hair blue.

It’s shocking. Especially in Lubbock. Shocking. I’ve been amazed at the number of people who simply cannot speak.

Literally. They can’t talk. They stand there with their mouths open. Literally.

Everyone stares.

I of course figured that there would be a lot of that. But in conservative Lubbock, there is a lot of that.

Walking down the street yesterday, Brandon (pictured above left) asked:

“Why is that guy staring … oh wait … it’s your hair.”

In West Texas, there is a Mexican food chain named Rosa’s Cafe. Yesterday was Taco Tuesday, and there is always a packed house on Taco Tuesday. So I went through the drive through.

The young woman wanted to tell me the total, $14.44, but she couldn’t speak.

Finally she spoke, I paid, and another young woman came running to the window, stuck her head half through it and said, “I LOVE your blue hair.”

Then despite the rush, pretty much the whole Rosa’s crew came to the window to check out my hair.

“This wouldn’t happen in Austin,” I thought.

But my friends — the true ones — have been amazing.

That’s how it has been for a day: awkward stares and lots of support.

Why I Did It

I have nothing really profound to offer here. I wanted to do it.

And I usually do what I want.

In approximately 1996, one of my college friends, Dandee, died his hair blue.

I was busy running the student newspaper, and I didn’t feel as if I could get away with anything like that.

At no point was it seriously considered. It wasn’t in the menu of options. I guess that’s the point.

It wasn’t even an option.

I didn’t think “too bad I cannot do that.” I just never came up.

So I ran the newspaper for two years, graduated, got real jobs, went to grad school, and started a faculty career.

And at no point during that span was it time to do something crazy.

Until it was.

I’m not teaching this summer. I’m advising two theses, one dissertation, a handful of independent studies, and trying to get some stuff published.

But I’m not officially responsible for more than two more months.

So I made a few jokes about blue hair.

And I probably never would have done it.

But a handful of people said, “You’d never really do that.”

And I’m not the kind of idiot who will eat worms or a box of thumb tacks if you dared me.

But I wanted to do this anyway, and this was a good time. And I like to call bluffs.

So June 9, 2009, was the day that I had my hair dyed blue. It was bleached almost white and then dyed.

And I like it. Yesterday I kinda liked it. Today I really like it.

Not because it makes me look better. Because, subjectively, I am quite sure that it does not.

But I wanted to do it — I knew it would lead to a great deal of taunting from my friends (and poor wife) — and I did it anyway.

And you learn a lot about the people in your life when you do something like dye your hair really blue. You find out who is really behind you.

And in large part, my friends are even better friends than I thought. And I knew I had some pretty amazing friends.

They’ve been amazingly supportive. Far more than I imagined.

Corny as it may be, that has warmed my heart. It made project blue worth it.

Sure, some of them may not want to have lunch with me. Because people will stare. But they have been supportive. Even though I am sure most of them secretly think it was a terrible idea.

And for that they have my profound gratitude.

Oh, and later in the day, my graduate student and friend, Brandon, got an indiustrial piercing in his ear (see picture). And he has my support.

That’s what friends do.

Tagged as: blue