Why I refuse to color my hair, even as it becomes painfully obvious that I REALLY need to start coloring my hair.

Growing up I was known to say (on more than one occasion) that "Miss Clairol will be my best friend when I grow up".

This meant two things at the time.  One - that I was certain I would go gray as I grew older since my Paternal Grandmother had gone completely white by her 20s and I knew I wasn't lucky enough to get my mother's genes that led my Abuelita into her 90s with very few gray hairs to speak off.  My mother now follows her lead and has a head of gorgeous black hair with only a few grays mixed in.

I have not been so lucky.  I found my first gray hair in my early twenties.  Staring at that shiny, unacceptable hair in the bathroom mirror, I remember the horror.  It left me shaken for days.  Of course I quickly plucked it and moved on.  In the next several years I would find a spare gray trying to sneak its way into my head of (otherwise) brown hair.  Until recently, my plucking method kept things in check.  Now, however, those pesky grays seem to grow inches long over night.  Just as I think I'm in the clear, 10 more sneak in under cover of darkness.  It's getting out of hand.

So I'm thinking more and more that it's time to succumb to the inevitable.  But I refuse.  Why, you ask?
 
Fear.

It's that simple.

I'm afraid of letting go and letting nature take its course.  Right now I seem to have things (mostly) under control.  Every week or so I inspect.  I pluck.  I regain control.  Lately, though, it's becoming every few days.  Or worse.  I find long gray hairs that somehow snuck past my inspection process for months to get to the lengths they are now.  Then it starts becoming unruly.  No longer are these little culprits easy to spot.  Easy to locate.  Easy to pluck.  They're getting more stealthy and blending in more.  Suddenly they're taking over.

It scares me.  If I start dying my hair to hide these nasty creatures then who's to say that in a year, or a few months even, that I won't have completely gray roots SNEAK up on me?!?  At least now I know what I have to contend with.  If I cover them up, they'll keep coming while I ignore the inevitable and before I know it I will have lost the war.  I know that sounds ridiculous, but it's the first straw to that growing older thing that I have no control over, ultimately.  I don't think I have this growing old gracefully thing down.  So, in the meantime, as I'm learning this complex skill...to dye or not to dye?...that is the question.