I have a lot of pet peeves.

People who interrupt. The word ‘normalcy’. Duct tape.

But there’s one pet peeve that is special. This particular annoyance, so innocuous in its execution, has a way of getting under my skin and making everything go red like few things do. That pet peeve?

Flashes. Camera flashes. Specifically, camera flashes during a show. Super specifically, camera flashes during a show that I’m lighting.

That’s right, they piss me off. But that’s not quite a strong enough sentiment to describe how they make me feel. Pissed off is what I felt when McDonald’s discontinued their Jalapeno Double. Pissed off is what I feel when expensive produce goes bad before I get to eat it. What I feel when I see a flash during a show is homicidal. I just want to get up from behind my console, find the offender, and bash their stupid skull in using their own phone. That’s how angry camera flashes make me.

I mean, y’all know that flashes during a performance are distracting as fuck, right? That’s why band after band and company after company makes a little announcement before the show and says no flash photography, right? So we can all establish that this is a well known fact that we are all aware of, right? Flashes are distracting.

The thing is, flashes are monumentally more distracting for me, the lighting designer, than they are for the average human being. I’m incredibly sensitive to light, and the slightest change and shift in light attracts my attention. (Especially because a change in light that I didn’t instigate has the potential to be mean that something’s going wrong in my world.) So a sudden flash of light, even if it’s coming out of the back of some asshole’s phone, steals my focus away from where it should be: the stage.

But that’s not the total reason I’m infuriated when a flash goes off in the middle of a show. No, the reason it pisses me right the fuck off is because it means that the offender refused to stop and think for even a second about what purpose a flash serves and whether it will serve that purpose in the present situation. Let’s think about this for a second, what does a flash do? A flash lights up a subject when there isn’t enough naturally ambient light so that your picture doesn’t turn out too dark. At any given time I am pointing about 40,000 watts of rig at that stage, I can guaren-fucking-tee that the tiny fucking flash on your stupid fucking iPhone isn’t going to brighten my stage. Unless, of course, you’re the jackass who takes a picture of the dimly lit stage right as the band walks on, and then all you’re doing is ruining the look I’ve so carefully put together to make your favorite rock star look like the music god that you remember instead of the decrepit corpse that he is today. So yeah, thanks asshat in the first row, thanks for ruining the illusion for everyone.

Most of you, on the other hand, aren’t lucky enough to be the asshat in the front row. Most of you are the douche-canoe further back, who’s stupid fucking flash won’t even reach the goddamn stage. No, your flash is doing nothing but lighting up the heads of the people in front of you, wildly distracting everyone around you (and me) in the process. So unless the objective was to take a picture of some guy’s bald spot, you don’t need your fucking flash.

Look, I’m sorry for yelling at you guys. I know you don’t mean it. You’re just really excited to see your favorite band, and you want to remember this moment forever. (Or for those of you who got blasted during the opener, tomorrow.) And you’re so excited to capture this moment of chaotic energy and excitement that you didn’t even think to check and see if your phone defaults to auto-flash. And your phone is stupid and only sees the darkness around you, so it tries to be helpful and use the flash. And neither you nor your phone meant anything malicious by it, you were just excited. I know, I get it. You didn’t mean to be an asshole, you were an accidental asshole. It’s just that flashes are so distracting…

So how about this, you guys promise to stop setting flashes off during the show, and I promise to stop wishing death by anal insertion of your phone upon (into?) you.

Deal?

Deal.

After four years of colorful hair, I’ve gotten a lot of reactions from people, of every conceivable variety. (Of people and reactions, that is.) From positive to incredulous to backhanded, I can’t hardly leave the house without multiple people having something to say about it. As most of it is positive, I don’t mind when strangers stop me and compliment my hair, and I try to give them a big grin and thank them every time.

But over the years, I’ve also grown a little weary of some of the reactions. Most often, it’s cases of well-intentioned strangers just trying to make a connection or make me laugh, but after several thousand interactions exactly like that, it starts to grind on me. I know they’re just trying to be friendly and give me a compliment, so usually I just clench my jaw and smile, maybe give them a little laugh that I hope sounds sincere. But sometimes, I wish social mores didn’t restrain me with politeness and I was allowed to say exactly what I think…

Five Things I’d Like to Tell People About My Hair

It’s never “for” something.

The obvious one is Halloween. “Oh, was it part of your Halloween costume?” But I’ve also had people ask me if I did it for breast cancer, St Patrick’s Day, even if my purple hair was in honor of Prince’s death. As if my hair was one of those stupid flag or rainbow overlays people put over their Facebook profile pictures.

I think the reason this assumption bothers me the most is because it tells me that the person is searching for what they deem to be a good reason why I possibly could have dyed my hair that color. That by making such a bold fashion choice, I must have something passionate to say. It tells me that they can’t grasp wanting to have purple hair for the same reason other people go blonde or red: because I like the way it looks. And that’s kinda insulting.

I don’t know why your hair got fucked up that one time you tried, but maybe it’s just because you’re an idiot.

Many a time has a stranger complimented me on my hair only to follow up the compliment with a story about the time they tried to dye their hair blue or pink or whatever only to have their hair ruined. And yes, I sympathize, it would totally suck to have your hair wrecked by a bad dye job.

Colors in pictures may be less cool than they appear.

But here’s the thing: I’ve never had that problem. I’ve never fucked up my hair. I’ve never had a color just straight up not turn out. I’ve never had things go tits up and have to run crying to my stylist. Have I had colors that I didn’t like as much as others? Sure. (See: my one attempt at bright red.) Have I had colors that didn’t last as long as others? You betcha. (Again, the red.) But I’ve never taken off the towel after rinsing my hair and said, “Fuuuuck, this is bad,” so I don’t know what to tell you.

So when you tell me that you ruined your hair or fucked up your color, I can only make one assumption: you’re an idiot. Because dying my hair? Not that hard.

No, it’s not my natural fucking hair color, and that joke wasn’t funny the first fifty fucking times.

Or even the first time. That joke almost always comes from a mid-fourties, early fifties white guy, and it’s always accompanied with a shit-eating grin that says that he’s pretty fucking proud of that little gem. What I hate the most about it is that there’s no real good response to it*, forcing me to simply smile and force a little giggle. Which I super hate doing.

*Not entirely true. There’s good responses, just none of them polite. I was once at the grocery store, in kinda a hurry, when some guy stopped me just so that he could bust out that quip in reference to my teal hair. I was so irritated that I looked straight into his eyes and with a stony face and said, “Yeah, my mom fucked a smurf,” and walked away.

I don’t think you understand how matching works.

Auuuugh, this one. If I am wearing an item of clothing, from my jacket to my watch to my shoes, that is in even the same remote side of the color wheel as my hair, someone will proudly point out that they match. As if they cracked my secret code or found Waldo. As if it was something other than the fact that I wear colors other than black and change up my hair often, so at some point my clothes will be a similar color to my hair. (There’s only so many goddamn colors in the world, people.) As if the possibility doesn’t exist that my hair was a different color when I purchased that particular item. Nope, I clearly go to extra lengths to coordinate my clothes and my hair to give idiots like you something to do. I’m your motherfucking walking Eye Spy game, right here.

But what bothers me the most is that nine times out of ten they don’t actually fucking match. Matching means that they’re the same color, not that a three year old would use the same word to describe them. Take this picture from a trip to Maine a couple years ago. My hair is a lilac with pink highlights. My jacket (Kyle calls it Muppet Coat, because when I leave it around he says it looks like someone skinned a muppet) is royal purple verging on indigo. Those colors are both purples, but they are not the same purple. If someone painted your wall with half one color and half the other, you would be pissed because they’re not the same shade, and therefore, don’t match. They coordinate, but they do not match. And yet, if I wear that jacket with that hair color I will have 15 fucking people (all of them very fucking proud of themselves) point out that my jacket matches my hair. And that’s just a mild case. Wear a green shirt with teal hair? They match. Is my hair currently lavender and my boots plum with red undertones? Matching!

Don’t. Touch. It.

Seriously, when did touching complete strangers become okay? What’s that? Fucking never? Then how exactly is it that strangers think it’s okay to reach out and grab a lock? I hate that! It’s not that I’m a super not-touchy person, exactly. If I know you and am comfortable around you, contact is fine. But having strangers reach into my personal space and touch me makes me homicidally uncomfortable. As if my hair color choice negates all social mores about boundaries. And besides, what exactly are they expecting when they touch my hair? That it’s a wig that will slide off at their very touch? That it will feel like plastic? That it’s something other than just hair? Frankly, I don’t give a fuck, I just don’t want them to touch me.

It usually comes up over nail polish.

I’ll be at the salon with a female companion who’s a little older than me, a friend or family member, and we’ll be standing in front the rainbow wall of polish making our personal selections. Predictably, I’ll be attracted to the color-equivalent of a shiny object–neon pink, metallic silver, purple so dark that it’s almost black. I can’t help it, I love color. My companion will inevitably say something to the effect of, “Oooo! That’s super cute, but I’m too old to pull off something like that,” before choosing a nude or pale pink for herself.

“Too old.” I hate it when they say that.

I hate it for one because I don’t think any of the women that I’ve heard utter this phrase are too old for shit. These are smart, accomplished, talented women, and I don’t think there’s much in the fashion world that they couldn’t rock the shit out of. (Maybe rompers? Because frankly, I don’t think they look good on anyone.)

But I also hate that phrase because it implies that there is an age between mine and theirs at which I will become too old for things like neon pink nail polish and purple hair and floral Doc Martens. A moment at which I will have clocked enough trips around the sun that suddenly the things that make me “me” will look ridiculous and pathetic and I’ll have to let them go or risk looking like I’m trying too hard. I don’t know what “that age” is, or how I’ll know when it’s here.

But “that age” can go fuck itself.

I can’t stand the idea of “that age.” That at some point, I’ll have to conceal my expression of myself so that I fit into society’s preconceived notion about what a “lady of a certain age” (another expression that can eat shit and die) looks like. Why do we have to get more boring as we get older? Is society that uncomfortable with the idea of someone besides teenagers looking like they could be the sort of person that has fun? And for that matter, why are only teens and young adults allowed to express themselves with abandonment? Most teens and young 20-somethings haven’t experienced enough life to be interesting people, what could they possible have to express besides a collection of naive cliches? Personally, I think most of us get more kickass as we get older, so why should our outward expression be suppressed as our kickass-ness grows?

What I imagine (and hope) is actually happening is big ol’ fatty case of “correlation does not imply causation.” That there may come a point in my life when I stop feeling like my hair and my boots accurately match the person that I am inside. I hope it doesn’t but I’m willing to concede that it’s a thing that could possibly happen. After all, there was a “that age” when I stopped feeling that body glitter was a required accessory for all special occasions, and there was definitely a “that age” when I let go of my belief that ringer tees featuring an ironic cartoon character were the cornerstone of a woman’s wardrobe.

So it’s entirely possible to believe that I may one day let my current fashion choices go. If I decide to stop dying my hair crazy colors down the road because it’s too much work or I don’t like the way I look anymore or I just don’t feel like it represents who I am, that’s fine. Change is a necessary and beautiful part of life. But I never ever want to feel like that choice is being foisted upon me because I’m “too old.”

“Too old.” Fuck that noise.

I prefer to think of it as “too awesome.”