Gray Hairs Are Like Invasive Plants

Gray hairs are like invasive plants. Once you get one rooted, you just can’t get rid of them.

As I read Carol’s delightful May Dreams post about having to pull her “Snow-in-Summer” plants to save her Geraniums, I realized how uncomfortably close it struck to home. Beautiful white flowers that are taking over her garden bed… much like the gray hairs that have become rather abundant on my head. If I attacked my gray hairs by pulling them out by the roots, I’d look like… no, that’s an image I just don’t want to imagine. Perhaps I did the first one I found, many years ago. Is that what started this aggressive take-over of my native roots?

I ponder often the dilemma of being natural in the face of invasives. I love the feel of a peaceful woodland setting, native plants growing wild. But that approach clearly didn’t work in my pre-gardening days. The weeds and invasives too easily too over the yard. In order for my yard to be “natural,” I’ve had to remove unwanted plants and purchase and plant native ones. And as I find my greener nature, I long to be free of the desire to color my hair. Let it grow out, be natural. Grow wild, like I want my yard to do. But if I do, I realize I am going to look a lot more like “Snow-in-Summer” than this 40-year-old might be able to handle. 

What’s one person’s weed is another person’s flower, right? Wildflowers are gorgeous to some, weeds to others. There are even butterflies that like poison ivy. I’m trying to embrace the gray hairs on my head as beautiful. Much like my garden beds full of baby plants, it will probably be easier to truly admire them once they’ve grown for awhile. Maybe I’ll just say I’m turning into a Gray Hairstreak Butterfly!