Motherhood has so many unspoken rules.

You have to remind your child to share at the park (even if your child is not listening), you have to try and make your own purees (story of my motherhood in six words: for sale, babyfood processor, never used), you have to buy Baby’s First [Fill in the Blank] merchandise (and if you don’t, others will do it for you — there’s no escape), you have to have a haircut less like the eccentric babysitter and more like the boring bill-paying, errand-running, professional-conference-attending adult you are…

Record scratch!  About that last one…

I got part of my pixie cut dyed jewel-toned purple. At first, I was thinking I’d pick something more subtle and refined; silver-grey is in right now, and I thought maybe I would lean into the feeling I’ve had lately of being tired and old, and go grey even earlier.  I would be a stately mama elephant, wise and sage.  But then, looking at the array of colors I had to choose from, I started to reconsider.  If my future is grey and I’m feeling it in my bones already, maybe leaning into it wouldn’t make me feel any better.  As I weighed whether I wanted silvery grey or warmer grey tones, I realized I didn’t like that I was limiting myself to transformations that (advertently or inadvertently) confirmed stereotypes about women (grey = natural and wise).  I refuse to let the assumptions about who a woman should be once she becomes a mother define me.

So purple it was.

There are a lot of motherhood rules and regulations that I abide by, as much as the next person.  I drive a mom car, wear mom pants, have mom conversations about how fast kids grow when making small talk.  I suggest my child finish her vegetables before having dessert if we’re out in public and do not always enforce this rule at home behind closed doors.  I wear mom cardigans.  Someday, I will likely embarrass my daughter with my doofy mom puns and portmanteaus (infinitely better than dad jokes, I’ll have you know).

But my hair gives me a little extra sass now.  I might wear generic skinny mom jeans and generic drop earrings and my Instagram might look about as boring as the next 30-something mom’s.  But my hair lets me show my personality in ways that my hobbies or professional life don’t.  Being a mom means so often fading into the background, being kind of boring while the kiddos get to wear the cool rainbow-colored clothes and barrettes.  I might routinely go to bed at 9PM, I might consider an exciting night to be watching a documentary while eating nachos after my daughter is in bed, but having a little swoop of purple in my hair lets me feel like the exciting, fun person my daughter believes me to be.  While I pay the boring bills and write the boring reports and clean the boring kitchen and go to my (exciting to me, boring to everyone else!) professional conferences, my purple hair reminds me that being the responsible adult doesn’t have to always, always, always be boring.