You Can't Always Get What You Want

"No!!!"

"Yes, I really want to be blonde."

"No!!!! You have such pretty red hair!"

"I know," I said, "But, I've had pretty red hair for more than a decade. C'mon, you can do this. Dig deep--it's within you to color my hair."

As I cajoled the stylist, my ambitions went from platinum to a nice strawberry blonde. About 90 minutes and enough chemicals to reignite the Cuyahoga River later, I emerged with this:

Sorry for the crappy cell phone pics again!

Voila!

It is … blondish. But very nice, if I do say so myself. And very different. It's swingy and chic and grown-up--the low-grade cell phone pics don't do it justice. Cori, my stylist, is a genius.

The funny thing is, Cori was right: I don't think it's the color that needed updating—just me. I don't know. Well, I feel like a different person now that I've "lightened up" and "straightened out."

I've oft said that Love Monkey and I are blogging soul mates. If you don't already follow her, well, then you are sorely missing out on some good stuff.

But, one of her most recent offering is about being a redhead and learning to love it, despite what other people think. How many of us have come to love a part of ourselves that previously caused us abjection? (My hand's up.)

Not to hit on the obvious, but I think of my rack, which caused me great consternation early on, not to mention my off-kilter outlook. I used to wring my hands because I didn't see things the way others did. Now, I am very, very grateful.

I don't know, kids. I've just really been hearing a repeating loop in my (newly-blondish) head: If not now, when?

So, I did another thing that I hope will alleviate something that's been weighing on me for some time – I signed on with a personal trainer. I sold a kidney bit the bullet and ponyed up the fee. I'm fighting the urge to call the move ridiculous because it's not—you can't put a price on self esteem.

Oh, and I'm not drinking these days. I haven't for quite some time, actually. I've hesitated to share that with you, my pretties. I don't know why. But, there it is. I've gotta say, on the whole, it's working for me.

Megan Jane shared something with me that one of her professors said that has really touched us both:

"No growth can be made with out great loss. I cried when I wrote that."

So true, no? It's a sad and accurate statement, but I don't know that I've learned a whole heck of a lot from the "gifts" that life has given—it's always been the losses.

At this point, I've "lost" the late-night boozy antics (all-right, the mid-morning ones, too), I've lost some of the darkness in (on) my head and I hope to lose a little bit (just a little bit) of the actual me. But, I'm gaining a lot. Mostly credit card debt thus far, but I'm hopeful.

Yes, the Stones had it right: You can't always get what you want, but if you try sometimes and pay out a lot of money, you just might just find, you get what you need.

Actually, I'm going to amend that: You CAN always get what you want, but sometimes you have to temporarily settle for what you need.

There, that feels better.

In the Comments section, tell me what you want most right now.