Red Hot Romance

Yesterday, marked a milestone in my life. After months of emails, Facebook and late night phone calls, Red and I finally met in person on May 2. That was six months ago. You can read about that meeting here.

I met @brettminor face-to-face 6 months ago today! #truelove
— Doesnt Speak Klingon (@NotKlingonRed) November 2, 2012

For any new followers who may not know who I am referring to, Red is the author of the blog Doesn't Speak Klingon. Several months before meeting, something sparked between us in the comment sections of each others' blog posts. I am not going to tell the entire story here, but Red has a page dedicated to this story on her blog. Click here if you would like to get caught up.

We've had trouble deciding what to tell people when they ask how long we've been together. We have been commenting on each others blogs since early January. The comment from me that started everything happened on February 13. Over the course of the next few months, we started emailing, exchanging gifts through the mail and making phone calls. However, the first actual face to face was May 2. Since we had pretty much decided we were falling for each other before then, we like to say we have been together longer than that, but most other people don't go for it.

Regardless of which date should be used to accurately measure the duration of our relationship, we have been together long enough that we need to look at ourselves and each other seriously. We have each learned a lot about the other over the last several months and surely have much more to learn. Being head over heels for this woman causes me to want to know as much about her as I can and I often feel that our occasional weekends and nightly phone calls just aren't enough.

In an attempt to learn more, I turned to the source I use for most of my learning: the internet.

One of the first things a person meeting Red for the first time will notice is her red hair, which is the reason she goes by Red. She never actually said that. I just assume it's the reason. Since her hair color is such a prominent part of her first impression, I did a little research to see if there is anything I need to know about redheads to help me get to know her better.

Scotland has the highest proportion
of redheads in the world (13%)

When I refer to her as a rare beauty, I have statistics to back it up. Red is the rarest hair color in the world. Only 1-2% of the entire world's population has this color naturally. Despite the rarity of this color, many redheads have influenced history out of proportion to their numbers according to Cort Cass. In his book, The Red Head Handbook, he listed several famous redheads: Roman emperor Nero, Helen of Troy, Cleopatra, the ancient god of love Aphrodite, Queen Elizabeth I, Napoleon Bonaparte, Oliver Cromwell, Emily Dickinson, Antonio Vivaldi, Thomas Jefferson, Vincent van Gogh, Mark Twain, James Joyce, Winston Churchill, Malcolm X, Galileo, and King David. This tells me that red heads aspire to greatness.

There are many stereotypes about redheads. One that I have heard my entire life is that they have hot tempers. My daughter and I even took a poll once asking people what redheads are known for. Over 90% answered that it was their tempers. However, there are other stereotypes as well.

• According to a Clairol Color Attitude survey, 71% of redheads think that the word “bold” describes them, which is 24 points ahead of blonds.
• While 49% of those polled in that same Clairol Color Attitude survey thought blonds were naïve, only 15% thought redheads were.
• Redheaded women are often associated with sexual prowess. Yay, me! In fact, according to Playboy magazine, "Redheads are like other women -- only more so."

There has always been something special about redheads. They were recognized as unique even in the days of the ancient Egyptians. Look what I found in this book:

It hasn't always been good to be a red head.
The ones who weren't sacrificed were buried alive.

• During the 16^th and 17^th century witch hunts, many women were burned at the stake simply because they had red hair.
• In ancient Rome, red headed slaves cost more than slaves with other colored hair.
• The ancient Greeks believed that redheads would turn to vampires after they died.
• In Michelangelo’s Temptation and in St. Paul's Cathedral, Eve is initially depicted as having brown and blond hair, respectively. But in both artistic renditions, after she eats the apple and she and Adam are driven from the Garden of Eden, Eve is depicted as a redhead.
• Hitler banned the marriage of redheads to prevent "deviant offspring."
• Mark Twain once said that, "while the rest of the human race are descended from monkeys, redheads derive from cats."

I know that I have always thought of redheads differently, but it's pretty clear that it is not just me. Redheads have been viewed as different almost since the beginning of time. So far, I have only listed stereotypes, but there are several facts about them that do make them a little different.

• Redheads do not experience a graying of their hair as they age. It typically goes blond and then turns to white.
• Red hair holds its pigment more than other colors, making it harder to dye.
• Red hair is a recessive trait, which mean that a redhead must inherit a red hair gene from each parent.
• Redheaded women report bruising more easily than women of other colored hair.

I feel that I have learned a lot about the woman I have been spending so much time with and I know that when Red reads this she will adamantly proclaim that there is more to her than just her hair, but I won't take it personally. It's not her fault. It's in her genes.