I got my first grey hair aged 24. I was lying in bed with my then boyfriend, at the top of a converted house in Leeds, listening to the Violet Femmes when he turned to me and pointed out the ivory invader. This, to be honest, was far better than the time he tried to brush an eyelash off my neck and it turned out to be a sprouting whisker.
Like that one friend who always turns up to parties 15 minutes before anyone else and proceeds to eat all the crisps, I had been expecting grey hair to come early. My aunt Steve went totally white in her thirties – years before she became the Minister of Conservation and Women’s Affairs in New Zealand (although jobs in politics have turned many a head of hair grey in their time). My aunt Liz was the same; her milky blonde hair turning white while her children were still small.
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My sister, who is eight years older than me, started going grey in her twenties. Like fallen arches, lower back pain and an unaccountable love of ITV detective dramas, I always knew it was coming for me. In 2016, a study from UCL identified the IRF4 gene; involved in regulating production and storage of melanin. There was, it could now be proven, a genetic component to going grey, as well as the usual culprits like stress, smoking and pollution. Luckily, as well as my genes, I had inherited a whole collection of women who had gone grey early and never pretended otherwise. I had snow-topped role models everywhere.
So, for the first 10 years, I wore my greying thatch with pride. To have grey hair in your mid-twenties is, I believe, chic. It is striking, unusual and provides an intriguing contrast to a youthful face. But then again, I have always leaned in fairly happily to the crone aesthetic. As a student, I dressed in the cast offs of Parisian grannies; 1940s dresses, handbags, chiffon scarves, the lot. When the first lines appeared around my eyes, I noted them with pride. I have never used anti ageing treatments, never injected, smothered or soaked myself in anything that claimed to halt the clock. Because to age is a privilege, an adventure, a precious triumph. It speaks of a life spent working in the sun, swimming through early morning mist, enough food, a strong heart and running forward, forward, forward.
And then my wedding came. I was already 37-years-old and mother to a five-year-old by the time I got married. I had lived with my partner for six years. We’d already bought a house, cycled across countries together and we were well past the stage of closing the bathroom door. My hair was probably about 50% grey, the ends bleached by the sun, the coverage scattered fairly evenly across my head. And yet, somehow, despite this show of commitment, I became seized by an urge to dye my hair. Did I want to look young in my wedding photos? Did I feel I should make some effort? Was I just curious about how I might look as a true brunette again?
It’s hard to say. In many ways, I resisted the industrial wedding complex – I sewed all my bridal outfits myself, made the decorations, picked the flowers from local hedgerows and didn’t even buy a new mascara. Still, about two months before we were due to say ‘I do’ I found myself buying a box of semi-permanent box brown hair dye and sloshing it on like a 1960s barmaid. It looked nice. My eyebrows seemed darker, the colour was interesting, I didn’t look like I was wearing a wig. And so, a few weeks before the official ceremony I repeated the process; only this time I accidentally bought permanent hair colour. It smelled of 1990s swimming pools, stained my ear and couldn’t be undone (I even tried to buy some of that hair colour remover – which was about as effective as washing my hair with Robinsons Fruit and Barley).
Growing out grey hair is about as fun as growing out a fungal nail infection. I quickly regretted my foray into false colour and so, once the roots started to show, I just cut it all off; for about two months my hair was shorter than both my husband’s and son’s.
Today, my hair is the colour of a hay field in late summer; neither brown nor blonde nor grey but everything, all at once. Strand by strand, it shifts through tones and temperature and decade. I can wear any colour and rarely bother with make-up. As a result, I look exactly as I am; a 39-year-old woman who has given birth, eats butter, climbs mountains, has written four books, laughs loudly, is confident in bed, swims through ice, has had her heart broken, does her tax return, shouts at bad drivers, dances on tables, can cook a meal with whatever is in the fridge and is loved.
The truth is, I’ve found it’s better to live than dye.
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