Eighteen

Whenever I dye my hair, the color usually holds fast for about 6-7 weeks until this patch of gray towards the front of my hairline comes peeking out, boasting its natural superiority to Preferance of L'Oreal's Dark Brown concoction. The men I know always, and I mean always, compliment me on the patch, and it's sincere too. I always smile, and say something meaningful and eloquent like, "Bite me." I am a tad cranky concerning my gray because of several irrefutable truths. The first one is that I am vain, yes indeedy and getting vainer by the minute on account of my body embarking on Mr. Toad's Wild Ride of aging. Things are moving south faster than horny Jersey frat boys barreling towards Ft. Lauderdale spring break. I have spoken of the Ninja joint ailments and then there's the Raiders of the Lost Ark-like discovery of hair in the most unlikely places and gray hair in places that will make you weep soundly in a fetal position under your bed. My hair is the only thing I can control and will control because let's face it, gray on a woman ages her profoundly. I don't care what the magazines say, it does and that's that. So this peak of gray, this patch of rebel follicles, mocking the measures that I take to keep it in line, well, that was the reason for my trip to Target this afternoon. I picked up the Clairol Root Touch Up, the best thing created since fudge covered Oreos.
As I am making my way to the cashier, I noticed lots of moms pushing shopping carts with kids inside. I'm not talking toddlers. I'm talking 4, 5 and 6 year olds. Getting wheeled around like they were Hef giving a tour of the Playboy Mansion. I nearly lost my mind, I did, because I've had a couple of weeks of dealing with really lazy kids at school. It's bad enough that most people are too stupid to live but now they are raising their children to be so lazy they can't even bear to walk around a discount store. And so I hit a new level of crankiness. As I passed these witless mothers, I muttered an audible, "Stupid" as I strolled by them. I'm probably out of line here, but honestly I feel exactly like the way LJ feels about little kids with Crocs on. How hard is their life that they can't possibly have on sneakers? Is the tying of the shoes a little too rigorous? It's the pervasive laziness that rattles me. And so I fear for the hair coloring industry of the future because with a demographic this lazy, who is going to go to the trouble of lifting their arms to color their hair?