I’ve been a dark brunette for decades. The first few of those, I served at the whim of nature. The last few, well, I served at the whim of beauty salon schedules and vanity combined with societal dictates as the tinsel on my head overwhelmed the natural tree, so to speak. But 2020 saw long months with no access to a hairdresser, first on the US side of my relocation and later on the UK side. I’ve never attempted the DIY bottled colours. I can barely operate a hair dryer. And me with even a simple mascara wand is recipe for disaster. (Think Michael Keaton in Beetlejuice.) A vat of dye? Not happening. I just don’t do hair and makeup. So pandemic dilemmas included whether to override my natural inability to embellish myself or override my intense fear of letting the world know I hadn’t been a brunette in a long time. There was only one option. I bit the silver bullet.

Luckily, the stars aligned for the Great COVID Grow Out. Millions of others were in the same boat. From Paul McCartney to several neighbours, we all took the plunge. Even Mona Lisa was photographed with that white skunk stripe down the centre of her head. I joined a Facebook group dedicated to the newly silver sisterhood. Its membership increased manyfold over the course of 2020. Countless of us felt forced to make a transition we weren’t ready for, hadn’t even considered before lockdown. It terrified us. What would people think? Co-workers? Family? Even our kids? Societies worldwide – and more importantly ourselves – judged us harshly for our pigment deficits. Entire industries profited from our desire to maintain membership in a world painted using the 20-something colour palette. It took the shock of a COVID world that no longer looked, felt, acted like the status quo to make us realise we didn’t need conformity either.

We of the Skunk Stripe Tribe became each other’s ‘call a friend’ when that siren call of the Clairol root touch up aisle threatened progress. We supported and lamented as we pondered whether to cut short, add lowlights/highlights, listen to loved ones, ignore loved ones, change our minds altogether and run back to the familiar comfort of the Redken bottle. There was no right or wrong answer. We had our careers and families and histories and people who loved us, no matter the colour of our hair. We focused on the upsides as the roots continued their downslide: we saved a fortune on colour treatments, and newly considered our impact on both the environment and our own health. We noted that rather than washing us out, the silver, in many cases, matched our views of ourselves better than the false narrative we’d been perpetuating.

I, personally, was grateful for the fortuitous coincidence of the grey hair trend that seemed to spring up last year. Youngsters were getting their blond/brown/black hair either streaked with grey or entirely greyed. As I walked past a teenager with her long, silver stream rippling in the breeze, I couldn’t help but think she’d look back at photos in a decade or two and realise she was now colouring to hide the grey she’d coveted back in 2020. Or maybe not. No matter. I smiled at her and wondered if she worried that the old lady in the street may have mistaken her for an Aging Ally rather than what she was going for: Instagram Influencer.

Anyway, the Great COVID Grow Out has been a challenge. Walking past a mirror and wondering when exactly grandma arrived, proved excruciating. Watching that silver parting become a silver sidewalk, then a blindingly white silver highway was jaw-droppingly disconcerting. Hats, headbands, scarves, not typically my thing, became the biggest fashion decisions of my day, beating which sweatpants to wear to greet the postman (from a distance) as lockdown dragged on. During a brief respite, when US salons opened in May, I succumbed to a few highlights to blur the stark rigid line between silver and brunette. It helped. A little. Well, not much, truth be told. The temptation to colour again intensified, the addiction strengthened. But I knew access to salon colour could disappear again anytime. I was on a plane to the UK in a few days. I’d be in quarantine, unable to see friends, meet new people, promote my books or attend functions. Didn’t that make this the perfect time to revert to nature? To appreciate what was important in self-care (handwashing, mask-wearing, self-isolation) and what wasn’t (camouflaging the aging process when so many were losing lives way too young)? I dug deep and vowed to keep growing. I’d come so far and would have to start all over again at some point if I gave up now. The good news: the transatlantic flight was nearly empty. The bad news: not a silver stripe to be seen on any of the flight attendants.

Arriving in England, I discovered the silver wave had carried like a tsunami across the Atlantic with me. The white caps breaking on the heads of many others was of some comfort. Make that a tiny bit of comfort. Awareness of silver regrowth is not the same as gnawing awareness you’re a generation older than when you started colouring your hair back in the nineties. I was lucky. I didn’t get pushback from family during Zoom calls as some making the transition did. My mother’s ‘It doesn’t look as bad a I thought it would’ raised a smile rather than heckles. Encouraging comments from my adult children were gratifying. Which brings me to my brightest, shiniest, tinseliest silver lining of the year 2020 …

… the opportunity to spend extended time with my adult children.

My son and daughter were eighteen years old the last time I spent prolonged periods around them. They headed off to college, one ten years ago, the other six years ago. They transitioned to fully-fledged adults during brief summer holidays and phone calls. Upon graduation, they moved away. One married. Hubby and I assumed our time with them would be short and infrequent as we all bopped around the world and followed our own paths. Then … COVID. My son and daughter-in-law were already living in London when I relocated back to England in May. My daughter decided to move over here a few months after I arrived. Between furloughs, unemployment and work-from-home restrictions, we decided to form one household for the foreseeable future. While I hate the reason we had to do this, I marvel at the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity it affords me.

The kids brought their boutique coffee brands and brewing equipment with them, which clutter the counters and make digging out my store brand teabags harder. They have favourite Malbecs and Cabs and even champagnes.  Champagnes? My Christmas Prosecco sits in the garage, untouched. Here I am, telling my kids back in the day we drank BabyCham and thought ourselves sophisticated. Books by authors I’ve never heard of on subjects I’ve never considered cover the coffee table. New documentaries, series, and stand-up comedians beam into the house via the Amazon Prime membership they bring with them. (I never signed up.) A whole new world.

I’m learning about the adults they’ve become while they learn about our new role as parents of adults; the role that no longer includes doing their laundry, cleaning their hair out of the shower drain, shoving coasters under their drinks or changing the toilet roll. (I hope they’re reading this.) My daughter pulls me out of the road to avoid a car and cooks exotic meals and tells me why I should be listening to such and such a politician because she’s got great ideas about such and such. The last time we lived together she was watching the Kardashians (I refuse to take the blame for this epic parenting fail) and wearing all the boys’ high school football jerseys. I listen to my son on the phone with bosses, co-workers, vendors while he gives presentations and justifies enormous budgets. He moves things, creates things, solves things at lightning speed. He used to take a whole day to empty the dishwasher. My daughter-in-law pushes her company to advocate harder for transition-to-work opportunities for prison populations. Together, these new (to me) adults research apartments and interview for jobs and discuss credit card bills and politics and have oh such strong opinions on subjects I’ve never considered in places I’ve never heard of and it astounds me. These are the joys of months spent with your adult children. You learn a whole new culture through eyes you created but that you lost the ability to see through years ago.

The switch came while I was colouring my hair.

How can I remain preoccupied with pigment when I earned every grey hair creating and raising these amazing human beings? If ‘non-brunette’ is the price I pay, so be it. Here, under this single roof, in a new beginning for us all, I marvel at what we’ve all become. COVID gave me that. 2020 won’t have been a complete loss. In fact, it may go down as one of the greatest family years yet, if we all stay healthy, that is. Let’s face it, nothing matters but that. No silver roots. No aging a generation in ten months. No nothing.

As the vaccine approaches and the light at the end of the tunnel moves from a tiny star-like dot to streetlight-sized orb and finally to a full-fledged beacon of relief, I’ll take these silver linings with me into 2021. I may arrive at midnight a generation older and with a lot of stress hormones under my belt, but I’ll arrive there grateful for good health, my family all together in my homeland, and a renewed impulse to tell stories full of silver linings.

Wishing you health, happiness and your own silver linings from this day forth. By the way, I love your hair. No matter the colour.

Photo credit: Kerry Gemmell