Live and Let Dye...or Die Another Grey?
Unless you are George Clooney, "silver fox" is just a polite way of saying "old". "Distinguished" is a euphemism for decrepit. Assisted dyeing may be the answer...so I hit the bottle.
“You’ve definitely done something.”
“I know…you’ve had botox!”
“Or fillers?”
“Or one of those non surgical face lifts?”
“Your skin looks SO much better. It’s kind of...glowing.”
No, I insist. It’s not my skin. It’s my hair.
“Yes, a hair cut! People who have face lifts or botox always have a haircut to divert attention away from their procedure.”
And so on
Finally, after some forensic examination, and a more detailed
confession, I manage to convince the assembled lunch table of friends
(and a significant other) that all I’d “had done” was my snow-grey
hair subtly tinted to match the natural dark blonde of my youth. Mainly at the
sides and temples where it was coarse and milky and, in the wrong light,
disappeared into my pale scalp like ice-cream skid marks against
Daz-laundered bed sheets and made me look like a wizard.
Why dye? And why now? I’d seen how Leonardo diCaprio had taken his hair to a
darker brown hair for appearances during Hollywood’s award season,
and admired Ben Affleck’s mid-life / post break-up crisis hair (head and
face) which transformed him from grouchy, pewter-faced grand-dad back
to hunky matinee idol, and thought, why not?
What I didn’t bargain for was a result which would be not just follicular
but almost holistic. Less grey, in every respect.
“Distinguished.” That’s what women will tell you when they notice a
man’s hair going grey. They’ll call you a “salt-and-pepper” “silver fox”,
comparing you favourably to famously snow- driven, distinguished types
like George Clooney and Richard Gere. And it’s nice of them to be so sweet and well
meaning, but really, “distinguished” is just a kind way of saying...old.
I hate my grey hair. Not least because it is actually more white than grey nowadays and not because it makes this old man look even older, either.
No - I dislike grey because of the way it spills its sallow, misery-making mizzle onto the rest of me.
For a fair-skinned, Viking jawed man such as your Substack reporter, being grey isn’t just a tonsorial thing - the grey, once it’s established itself, seems to take over, extending to one’s general look and countenance. Grey hair fosters a grey face, a grey complexion, a grey outlook, a grey man. That’s how I feel when I look in the mirror or catch sight of my candid self in photographs.
Who is that old, miserable, grey, down-pipe of a man? Oh dear... it’s me.
Grey hair is the head’s way of reminding you that death is not far
off; I call it the grim crimper. It’s also something that most of us men will
have to deal with sooner or later; according to a report by the
International Journal of Trichology, some 50% of the population will have
about 50% grey hair by the age of 50.
How does it happen? Age-related melanin depletion is a factor. Old
grey hair has less melanin than healthy young hair. White hair has
none at all. A natural pigment that gives colour to human hair and eyes
and is key to determining skin tone, melanin’s pigment-containing cells
(melanocytes) decrease as we get older, making us whey-faced
males even paler (and staler.)
Greying is definitely, predominantly, an age thing, and also mostly
hereditary (my dad was grey at my age). It affects different races in multi
shades of grey too; Caucasians most severely and commonly, then
Asians, and lastly Africans. If a man has dark hair in his youth it will
probably age to chromium silver - like George Clooney’s much loved
(pre jet-black dye job) salt-and-pepper mop. If he was a naturally blonde kid (like I was) his barnet will most likely go Santa Claus white.
How about stress? Can anxiety, worry and trauma turn a dark head grey? A few decades back a friend suffered a brain tumour and required urgent cranial surgery.
When he recovered, his hair “came out a funny colour and needed dyeing.” Had the sudden impact on his body’s metabolic rate weakened cellular performance, caused a disruption in pigment- producing melanocytes and accelerated his greying ? (He was in his early 30s when he discovered his brain tumour) . Having fully ecovered he kept his hair a coppery dark brown, reverting to his natural, titanium shade ten years ago...immediately oining the ranks of lucky “silver fox” types who carry their age and experience with confidence.
What a man chooses to eat seems to have an effect on his hair colour.
Diets deficient in iron, vitamin D and B might encourage and accelerate
grey hair while foods loaded with antioxidants - beetroot, dark chocolate,
blueberries, strawberries, raspberries, spinach etc - will fight against the
build up of hydrogen peroxide in hair follicles, and can help it stay a
healthy, natural colour. Men who drag on cigarettes for long periods
might notice the toxics in the smoke turning hair a yellowy grey.
So, trauma, diet, melanin, nicotine , genetics, race and age. As an
anxious, old caucasian who had a white-haired dad, who devours milk chocolate
and doesn’t like to eat much kale or spinach, my hair never really stood a chance.
My choice? (And every other grey man’s choice). Either leave it, embrace aging and greyness “with dignity” (another example of grey flannel - “with dignity” just means old, btw).
Or hit the bottle.
There is, ironically, no grey area.
So, after years of watching the sides of my head pale into ghostly
insignificance (and my beard, when i didn’t shave, mutating to a Father
Christmas white) I answered one of those dismal marketing emails that
seems to dominate your inbox once you hit 50 - funeral companies,
pension plans, reversion mortgages, care homes etc. - and signed up
for a DIY / home treatment product.
Consultation came in the form of a series of multiple choices and
ticked boxes before my “bespoke” natural hair tone was revealed. (“Dark
blonde’ - I could’ve told them that myself.)
Then, a few days later, a discreet cardboard box arrived. I took it to my
bathroom and locked the door. Two tubes of goo. A mysterious gunk
for smearing along one’s hair line to ensure against embarrassing dye
marks on the scalp and Disposable polythene gloves. For a cape, I put a
bin-liner tabard over my head and began to paint the sides of my head
with stuff that ponged like Smurf’s flatulence, waited the prescribed time
period, then rinsed it off.
Had I overdone it? Would I end up like George Clooney? A former
silver fox now a crow-headed sleaze with hair apparently from a super
market bottle that had passed its sell-by date some time back in the
1960s? (Clooney has dyed his hair black for a theatrical role on
Broadway - even he admits it looks “bad’) Or had my bespoke
consultation mis-judged me, and mixed up a concoction that would turn
my white tresses to a brassy, nicotine-ish yellow?
Or Like Ronald Reagan’s? (“Ronnie doesn't dye his hair,” President Gerald Ford once
said of President Reagan who was suspiciously dark into his 90s. “He's
just prematurely orange”).
Or, worse still, Donald Trump’s? (Word has it that the president’s strawberry-milkshake blonde colour is maintained by a product called “Just for Men” - the longer it is left on, the darker blonde the hair goes. But Trump, noted biographer Michael Wolff, is unable to let the concoction sit for the full five minutes - as stipulated on the Just For Men box’s instructions) without becoming agitated and impatient. Hence the brassy tone.)
I needn't have worried. The colour change was so subtle it was almost
undetectable. After a few washes I was back to whitey-grey again. And
coarseness.
Did I mention that white hair is not soft, just-left-the salon hair? It is
un-elastic and rough. Mine has the texture of tennis racquet cat-gut,
growing out of my head like a series of albino triffids. With our
production of the natural moisturisers in our sebaceous glands lessening
as we age (are you starting to see a pattern here?) grey / white hair
becomes dry and brittle, coarse and kinky.
Professional hairdressers like colour specialist Arron Taylor at John Freida’s Mayfair salon, recommend the use of quality, omega 3 and protein rich shampoo to
keep grey hair in good, hydrated condition.
After a thorough examination of my “grey” hair (“It’s actually completely
white,” it was confirmed ) and any remaining, still-blonde hair, Arron mixes up a bespoke formula “designed to blend seamlessly with the natural hair tone.” His
expert eye and alchemy will create a colour with a softened, overall
effect, “avoiding a heavy or artificial finish, and ensure a more
natural-looking regrowth.”
Along with making cuffs match the collar, I am also hoping that the treatment will transform my grey face, grey outlook, grey complexion and lift my grey mood...and take ten or 15 years or so off me. Am I expecting too much from a little pot of creamy unguent and a one inch brush?
More and more men are coming in to have their grey hair treated, he tells me. Mainly 40, 50, 60 year olds and professionals working in banking and the art world. “Social media is to blame,” says Arron. “Everyone needs to look good in photos, on zoom calls and on Instagram these days.” The treatment is quick (around 45 mins per session) and discreet. “Some men are a bit embarrassed and like to have it done while they are having their hair washed. Hardly any one notices.”
Will I notice? Will my friends notice? Applied correctly and professionally (ie not with tell-tale dye marks on the neck and forehead that DIY home colourists end up getting) can have a huge effect on the face, he assures. “Your skin tone has more life, the hairline around the eyes and temples is visible again and this frames and narrows the face… gives it structure again.”
Would I not get that from a bottle off the shelf at Superdrug? Arran lets me into a little secret. The colour you see on the male models on the boxes of those home dye kits is never the same colour that the product will actually deliver. “To achieve the colour in those photos, they’ll have used a much more expensive product which will have been professionally applied.” How does he know this? “I’ve done a few shoots for home dye kits myself,” he admits.
After 20 minutes, we rinse and towel and I look up and hardly recognise myself. I still look like me, but a better version of me. Not George Clooney sleazy or Ronald Regan orange but a subtle blonde / brown . My eyes are a sharper colour, my skin has a glow, I have a semblance of cheekbone. I feel good. More confident, defined and yes, a teensy bit younger.
The Grey Crimper is off my back.