Hello! Thought I'd start this blog with a raw photo of me and my gray hair. It's real. It's mine. This is how a 55-year-old woman looks. And boy do people have a problem with it.
When I say people have a problem with gray hair, I mean men and employers have a problem with it.
Back when I was in my mid 40's I decided to let my natural hair color grow out. My natural hair color then was salt & pepper gray. In the last ten years, I dyed it blonde once. A year later I cut all the blonde hair off and started all lover again resulting with what you see in the photo. This time grayer hair grew out. I like it. A lot.
Employers hate the hair color. When I asked Google what the best jobs are for women 55+ Google responded with "work for yourself". Gee, why didn't I think of that? 😒 No one wants to see a 55-year-old woman in the workplace anywhere apparently.
I wish women would allow themselves to age gracefully. People wouldn't get so freaked out seeing natural gray hair on older women. It truly scares people. Society is more aware of our own individual mortality, death and dying, than any generation before us. I'm not talking about war; I'm talking about the fact we all die someday. We're born. We die. We are more aware of this in 2024. Getting old is natural. Gray hair is natural. What isn't natural or healthy for that matter is how freaked out people are by it.
I hear my generation (Gen X) poke fun of aging by saying things like, "We're not ready for Bingo and knitting" meanwhile I'm over here thinking what's wrong with bingo and knitting? I like Bingo. I've like playing Bingo since I was a kid. I also knit. I started knitting when I was a kid, and then again in my 30's, and again now.
Prior to my stroke in 2021 I could still run around five miles a day. I loved being awake and highly active. You couldn't catch me. I was 52 when I had my stroke. Now I'm tired after being awake for eight hours. Naps are my friend. I love naps. But had I not had a stroke I would still be on my feet running around twelve hours a day no problem.
I don't know a single person my age who hasn't already had one medical event like a stroke or a heart attack. We Gen X'ers purposely beat ourselves up for fun for forty years. We crazy like that. But there's consequences resulting in a fistful of daily prescriptions for the rest of your life. Still, you can't look at that photo up there and say, "She looks like she's had a stroke. Don't hire or date her." No. That's ridiculous. And yet both men my age and employers don't want anything to do with me. One lady on a zoom interview stared at my hair for the entire interview. It was a job interview for a Los Angeles university. The HR lady just stared at my hair making a frowny face. Awkward. (Yo! Eyes down here ma'am!)
I don't care what politicians say, I'm retiring when I'm 62. That's in seven years.
Think I'll make it?
Lisa
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