Can I dye my hair?

Kitty recently had a sleepover at a friends house where one room was entirely devoted to hair, the family had there very own salon. Kitty was very entertaining when recounting stories of girls hair at school, she attends a girls school and is in a minority being white, 70% of the girls at her school are Black or Asian and as she tells us hair is a big issue in their lives so much so it requires its own room sometimes, and she says its absolutely imperative that you comment on a new style many of which change twice a week. A recent blog highlighted the lack of Black and Asian women on the catwalk and in many mainstream fashion magazines but in a way I see that as a positive, it means that much of their style is a product of their cultural heritage not what they see on the catwalk, and as kitty notes it creates rather than follows, and leads to a more individual style. I grew up with a mother who struggled endlessly to “find” her style, a visit to the hairdresser was traumatic and she would rush home in tears, wash her hair and stick it in rollers crying she had only asked for an inch off, a hair dressers inch is a very mercurial inch indeed. Did I heed this misery to stay clear of the hair salons? no I did not, I too was sucked into the vortex of self flagellation, from a Purdy to a perm, from henna to highlights, no form of experimentation was left unexplored and none provided me with what a had envisioned. Once Trevor Sorbie paid ME to cut my hair how bad must I have looked? (before not after i think!)Even as recently as 4 years ago I was still trying with hair straighteners and low lights but then a misogynistic butcher gave me a head of highlights that made me look grey over night, so as an exercise in damage limitation I scooped it up into a pony tail where it has stayed ever since, some times brushed sometimes not and cut with sewing shears. This weekend I heard the dreaded words “mum can I dye my hair” Oh God.