On things frequently not being what they initially seem.

Three facts:

1/My hair is pink.
2/My dog is timid.
3/


Are these things related? Yes indeed. They are related because they are all not what they initially seem. It goes like this:

1/ Since I had bright pink streaks put in my hair people have started to look at me differently. At my son's school I no longer conform to the normal stereotype 'Mum'. In public people look at my hair, look at my clothes and then look at my hair again. You can actually see them thinking, "Well her hair is weird but her clothes are normal. How can that be? What is she?" I don't fit into any box that they want to fit me into. I'm not a 'weirdo' or a 'freak' because my clothes are 'normal' but I also can't be classed as 'normal' because my hair is pink. I like it. I like the fact that people feel uneasy and can no longer make an instantaneous judgement about me. But I am still me. I am still exactly the same person as I was when my hair was brown, or blonde or red or whatever. But for the people who don't know me I am no longer a person they can categorise easily, and that's cool.

I am not what I initially seem.

2/My dog appears timid. He's tiny (half the size he should be) and he doesn't like strangers, he's a scaredy dog. To the general public he appears to be a boring, frightened, shy little thing. But he isn't. When he knows you, he is lary and stupid and ridiculously funny. He dashes round and round in ever expanding circles in the park. He comes to fetch me if my son is calling and I don't hear. He tries to play all the time, with anything he finds. If I put my boots on to go out he steals my walking socks and runs away. He can do trick after trick after trick and people that do know him think he's hugely funny and very clever indeed.

He is not what he initially seems.

3/The picture above of pavement art is the best example, but there is more here if you want to see. I don't really need to say anything about it now because you can see if you look and look at the images.

They are not what they initially seem.

So three silly things. Three irrelevant unimportant things, so simple, so everyday. It makes you think about the huge number of things that we come across or people that we meet that we make initial snap judgements about, but that are really nothing like we first think.

And maybe, it's quite likely that nothing is what it seems.

Don't you think?