I can remember the first time I started messing around with my hair color. I was in high school and I couldn’t stand my drab, black hair. I wanted to have beautiful brown hair like models Cindy Crawford and Helena Christensen flaunted in fashion magazines. So what do I do? Instead of consulting a highly-trained, knowledgeable colorist, I squeezed lemon into my hair and sat out in the modest Seattle sun for hours. In college, I dyed my hair at least once a month with every brown shade Clairol and L’Oreal had to offer. I even had shades of pink and red that would have made my parents blush in shame, if they had seen it. By the time I got into the real world, I was earning decent money and could finally pay someone to color my hair. I wanted to go lighter, so I let someone bleach my hair to achieve medium and light brown shades that I swore looked great at the time. Of course, looking at those pictures now, I did not look good. Why didn’t anyone tell me?

If I could take it all back, I would.

Now I only color my hair once a year, usually when the summer ends, because my hair color gets funky after being in the pool so much. Unfortunately, I realized this fall that I have more white hairs than ever, and they needed to be covered right away. Is this my fate as a 34-year-old? I needed to find some hair color ASAP.

Having tried every brand of hair color available, Clairol’s Perfect 10 Hair Color caught my eye. Beautiful, shiny color that looks conditioned and healthy in 10 minutes? This I’ve got to see.

The color was easy to mix, very similar to traditional store-bought hair dyes where you mix one agent with another and shake for 20 seconds. Perfect 10 comes with a regular applicator tip to use on roots or the PerfectColor Color Comb to apply color all over. Although my roots had some white peeking through, I choose the comb because the chlorine in the pool did a number on my hair this year. The comb worked very well — too well. Should I be suspicious? I waited 10 minutes, which went by quickly. With traditional at-home hair color you usually wait 30 minutes, and by that time you’re ready to pull your hair out.

After rinsing the color out, I applied the ColorSeal Intensive Conditioning Creme to my hair and left it on for two minutes. And I was done. I blow dried my hair and was surprised to see how well the color looked: a rich, dark brown hue that glistened in the sunlight. It really glistened! My hair was incredibly soft — no crunchy strands here. Goodbye white hair!

I can’t believe I have a great hair color and it took no time at all; I did it just before I had to drive my daughter to school. Now if Clairol could just come up with a 10 minute hair color that is organic and doesn’t contain harsh chemicals, I’d be even more ecstatic. Clairol Perfect 10 is not green by any means, but boy does it make at-home hair color convenient and fast.

Clairol Perfect 10 Hair Color, available at drug stores everywhere.