By Emili Vesilind
Special to the Los Angeles Times

The brighter side of gray hair
A movement is underway as everyday women forgo hair dyes and let their locks go gray.

Washing that gray right out of your hair (to borrow from the famous song) is no longer a mandatory part of getting older. So asserts a growing cadre of American women who are embracing their naturally silver hair tones.

Letting tresses go gray (or white or salt-and-pepper) may not be the Hollywood way, but it’s become a hot topic for real women all over the country. Seeds of a colossal shift in thinking — away from the arcane preconception that going gray means “letting yourself go” — have already taken root.

Going gray is the most commented-on theme on More magazine’s website, which caters to women over 40. The “Today” show recently featured a seven-minute clip about whether it’s “OK to go gray,” and how to do so gracefully. And recently published books about ditching dye-jobs for good, including Diana Lewis Jewell’s “Going Gray, Looking Great!” and Anne Kreamer’s “Going Gray: What I Learned About Beauty, Sex, Work, Motherhood, Authenticity, and Everything Else That Really Matters,” continue to sell briskly, and (in the case of Jewell’s book) have inspired the formation of online mini-communities based on a shared belief that going gray is more than OK.

Read More: Los Angeles Times

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