Things that Once Were Normal

Dearest Rachel –

You’d think I was up late last night (and it may well have been, since Daniel joins me to hang out only once Logan heads off to bed at nine, which is too early for even me to call it a night); somehow, I didn’t open my eyes until it was almost eight in the morning today. I didn’t even have a dream that I can recall for you, so sound was my slumber. So what can I tell you about this morning? More to the point, what can I talk to you about that isn’t fraught with more politics and symbolism than I’d care to deal with (and which would possibly anger those that might be reading over your shoulder – not that I’m addressing anything to them, but there are certain people who it is apparently unwise to anger) in a public letter to you?

Even as I was hauling the trash out on Monday evening, and wondering what you might think about the fact that we throw away so much more than we used to when it was you, me and Daniel, I found my mind wandering to what you might think about other things that were normal back then that have so many more connotations than they used to. I wish I could ask you about them, but I know that I can’t.

Consider, for instance, the fact that you dyed your hair throughout your last half-dozen years or so – and made no secret of it, since it was of a hue that wasn’t what could be called ‘natural’…

You insisted that you “would rather go purple than go gray,” and once the natural color started to drain from your hair, you made a point of getting this or that coloring – you never quite settled on a specific hue, but seemed to tend toward the blue-violet as opposed to the plum of your first attempt – and, with the occasional assistance of one of your friends (particularly Kerstin), you would update the color every couple of months.

The things you put yourself through in order to maintain that color, too, often astounded me. I could never put up with washing myself in so much cold water just to ensure that as little of it would fade as possible. Nor could I deal with messing up so many towels and other fabrics as part of the dyeing process. Along these dame lines, I wouldn’t be able to trust a friend with helping me do any of this in the first place – maybe it’s a female thing; guys couldn’t do this. Then again, when it comes to my hair, I’d be more concerned with what’s defecting from my scalp to the pillow as opposed to what’s losing its color, so maybe it’s a matter of differing priorities, too.

But of course, nowadays there’s a certain… I won’t say ‘stigma,’ but an association, with dyeing one’s hair such colors. There’s a certain type of person that does this sort of thing, and so much more so than back when you started doing it. And even back then, we were aware of it; hence, your catchphrase about “going purple” over “going gray,” to make it clear that this wasn’t so much a political statement as it was a favoring of one (admittedly unnatural) color over a lack thereof.

The thing is, that type of person that you had to make abundantly clear you were not has, since you left, gotten that much more prevalent, as well as that much more… how shall I put it? obnoxious? intolerable (and intolerant)? confrontational? I mean, I know people with dyed hair that are perfectly reasonable, but there are so many that show up in the news these days. They’re like the rednecks from the old Jeff Foxworthy routine, where the worst of them always get in front of the camera, and make the rest of y’all look bad. Either that, or the ones I know are the exceptions to the rule.

I wonder if it’s gotten to the point where these camera hogs make the practice look so bad that you might give up on the effort if you were still around. Would you let yourself go gray in order to disavow any possible association with such folks? Or would you continue to try to prove that, just because your hair was purple, it didn’t mean you were making a statement other than that you loved purple? Like I said, I wish I could ask you about these things.

***

The other topic I’d have liked to chat with you is about someone who clearly doesn’t dye her hair (or perhaps just gave up on the effort; in any event, the past two decades have not been kind to her, other than the fact that she doesn’t seem to be struggling with her weight like she used to) that you used to… again, I won’t say ‘idolize,’ but it went beyond following or respecting – which, in fairness, didn’t preclude you from calling out your heroines when you thought it was warranted. You even subscribed to her magazine (when she had one), although I got rid of the copies as part of the purge; I knew I wasn’t going to read them, and there was no sense holding onto them for you to read, as you weren’t coming back.

It seems that, unlike previous time, when a flock of celebrities threatened to leave the country because something happened that they didn’t like, there are actually some that have done so this time around. Not sure why, as things aren’t that much different now than they were a few months ago, but it’s literally a free country, and they are free to come and go as they please. Well, this one has joined the exodus, and I would have been interested in your thoughts on that.

To be sure, I’d wager that your last thoughts about her were years before your departure. Those magazines I got rid of had been gathering dust for a decade already, and I doubt her name had crossed your mind for ages. So maybe this was a way for her to thrust herself into the limelight one last time, for her stunning bravery in leaving the country, which anyone is more than free to do at any time. Heck, I did that for a good three months last year; it’s not that hard. To be sure, living elsewhere is a bit more of a challenge, although more from the difficulties on the other end. The place one moves to will have restrictions of its own one needs to deal with, and it may be interesting to see how that shakes out.

If it turns out to have been a bad decision, I suspect we’ll never hear about it. Thanks to the sunk cost fallacy, people generally have difficulty in acknowledging mistakes; celebrities (which she was, once upon a time) that much more so (aside, apparently, from marital ones, given their divorce rates). I suspect we’re not going to find out how this story ends – but since you aren’t here to see this particular chapter anyway, it probably doesn’t really matter all that much.

Still, if you feel like keeping an eye on her for the time being, and wishing her luck, I won’t object. Most likely, she needs it more than I do at the moment.