I don’t want to blow my own trumpet but, in recent years, I have correctly forecast the outcome of some of the largest political events of our time, even when the polls suggested I was wrong.
Scottish referendum? I predicted the union would remain intact. EU referendum. I warned you. US election Hillary v Donald? I called it. 2017 general election? Nailed it again, even down to the Theresa May not having a majority bit. Tory party leadership challenge over The Deal? Yep, once again, I was right.
What I’m saying is that I’m starting to wonder whether I might be the Mystic Meg of the digital age. That and I don’t spend much time on Twitter which, let’s face it, puts you much more in touch with reality as a journalist.
So, come a little closer because I have a 2019 prediction for you and it is hot off the press. I haven’t told anyone or placed any bets. Yet.
Think again before you blow two week’s salary on a boujis five-hour hair colour appointment at the sort of salon where an espresso martini is made for you before your hair has even been washed. Stop scrolling through Instagram bookmarking images of ‘colours you’d like to try’. Do not ruminate over the phrase ‘blondes have more fun’ any longer.
Why? You heard it here first – not dying your hair is going to be big in 2019.
I grew up absorbing adverts that screamed ‘buy me I’ll change your life’ and watching make-over shows on TV with films like She’s All That on repeat. So, by the time I’d heard of Barbara Kreuger I had already absorbed the messaging and on a deep primal level I believed that spending money to change your appearance would actually make you feel differently about yourself.
Dramatic celebrity hair transformations are written up as symbols for us to decode, clues as to what they’re really going through. Remember Kate Middleton’s fringe? Victoria Beckham’s POB? That time Sienna Miller switched her signature blonde boho look for red?
In April this year my life changed. Massively. I turned 30, I left a job which I don’t think it would be over the top to describe as my dream job because I needed to know what else was possible and I started writing a book which is something I dreamed of doing as a kid but never thought anyone would actually ever pay me to do.
The 30 thing didn’t really hit me until after the event. I was nonplussed in the run up, determined not to buy into the hype or engage with the idea that I was supposed to have an identity crisis.
In the weeks that followed, though, I found myself mourning the end of a decade – a decade – of my life and searching for meaning as I began a new one.
The job thing was weird. The loss I felt was far greater than I had prepared myself for. I have since read that many people feel like they’re going through a bereavement after leaving a job because it fundamentally changes your identity.
And the book, well…it’s still being written. I feel a lot like how I felt when I got into Oxford from a state school, the first person to go to uni in my entire family. By this I mean I oscillate wildly between feeling like a total fraud and moments total self-confidence.
At this point, it’s probably worth noting that the last time I dyed my hair (an ill-advised shade of ginger) it was at Oxford. I did it after a breakup at a time when I felt like a tourist in a town that was supposed to be home.
Don’t think for a moment that I don’t recognise the immense privilege of what I am about to say and I recognise that, as a white woman, my hair is a far less politically and psychologically loaded thing than it is for other women.
I decided the only thing to do was to dye my hair. I hadn’t done it for 9 years. I had always wanted to dye my hair red. For some reason I felt like it would reflect a version of myself that I wanted to see but I’d never taken the plunge. I’d toyed with the idea, dangled it around as both a threat, a promise and an exhilarating possibility.
It sounds so basic but during this period of feeling like I was doing doggie paddle in a pool of slime, just trying to find something firm to hold onto, I felt like going red would centre me, signal a new beginning and also be a constant reminder that change is healthy.
4 hours and £200 later I had bright red Scarlett Johansson in The Avengers hair. For a few weeks it was great. It got many a compliment and I won’t lie, I basked in them.
“Oh My God...you look like you but better”
“Your eyes have never looked so blue”
“You look like a comic strip villain”
It was great. Me…but…better. Vicky 2.0. What an enticing prospect she was. Isn’t that basically what all make up, tweakments and so-called “investment” purchases are meant to do for us? They improve us, they help us be the best possible version of ourselves and to prepare an outward manifestation of who we want to be for the rest of the world.
And then, my naturally gingery dark blonde roots began to creep through, pushing the luminous red away. I would stop to look at them in shop windows or use the camera on my phone to check them as I sat on the bus.
I did not look carefree. I did not look like someone who embraced change. I did not look like ‘me but better’. No. For the first time in my life I looked like someone with a hairstyle, someone who spend precious time and money on cultivating a look.
An act I had thought would make me feel young and spontaneous suddenly had me tied to regular colourist appointments I couldn’t really afford. My schedule became dictated by my roots – they were not only a monthly reminder that upkeep was required but, as cheesy as it sounds, of the less well-kept version of myself that I had glossed over.
I railed against the sense of obligation to keep getting them done. It felt too grown up, too conformist. I resented what I had done to my appearance and, begrudgingly, came to the realisation that I was, actually, happier and more comfortable in my own skin before.
Looking at the roots made me long for what I had once thought was my unremarkable natural colour. I longed for the person it belonged to, she was actually pretty great. I was in mourning, regularly scrolling through old pictures on my phone just to get a glimpse of a hair colour I’d always dismissed as ‘boring’.
Suddenly ‘boring’ was remarkable. The colour coming out of the bottle could never recreate the tone and depth of my natural colour. I had erased so much of who I was without meaning to.
We think that the solution to uncertainty in our lives lies externally. Perhaps we’re taught this – that we can fix how we look, change our appearance, rebrand on social media or find a new partner when we aren’t happy with who we see looking back at us in the bathroom mirror.
The truth, which I reluctantly accepted when I agreed to do a bleach bath on my hair to get it back to anything resembling my natural colour knowing it would wreck the condition of my hair for the next year at least, is this: We’re taught that we aren’t enough, that we could always be improved, tweaked and updated but we’re mostly fine as we are. More than fine, we’re often much better than we give ourselves credit for being.
Hundreds of pounds, a bleach bath, some dodgy highlights and more than 24 hours in a hairdresser’s chair later I still don’t have my natural colour back and I can officially confirm that changing your hair won’t necessarily change your life, but it will distract you from it.