It's a darker red, dark enough to almost qualify as Auburn. Almost. As a teenager, my attempts to call my hair "auburn" were met with, "Dude. Your hair is red."
Touche.
Growing up with red hair is difficult. As a very small child, I was bald until the age of two. By age three I had a head full of red ringlet curls. Red ringlet curls. I wore a metaphorical "Kick Me" sign.
In addition to red ringlet curls, I was horribly, terribly, painfully shy. Adults would zoom in, hands outstretched, desperate to rub my head and ask the source of my hair color. What, it came from your grandmother? And your father? You don't say!
I never made a peep during those encounters. I hid behind my mother.
By about age 5, my ringlet curls straightened naturally. My hair's thick, so we think the weight of my hair murdered the curls. My mom was devastated. I was ecstatic. I think my immense fortune proves something: there is a Santa Claus.
By age 8, I had shed a good deal of my shyness. I was a happy-go-lucky kid, who made friends easily and loved to sing, dance, read, and write.
People of Earth: no amount of happy-go-lucky disposition, faintly discernible talent, and oodles of friends will counter the effects of having red hair as a child.
You are going to be teased.
You will invite the concerned looks of friends, who will mournfully ask, "Do you like having red hair?"
You will be asked if you're married to Al Bundy.
All while attracting the considerable attention of every elderly person within twenty feet of you. All while you retain your fierce apprehension of and shyness around unfamiliar adults.
So when Ian casually remarked, "If we have children, I hope they have your hair," you can understand why I exclaimed, "No, a thousand times no! A pox on thy very thought! 'Tis a cruel vexation! Oh, what a world, what a world..." <melts into a puddle of witch water>
Ian felt a little upset by my reaction.
Ian: "You have beautiful hair. I love it. I don't know anyone else with your shade of red."
Laura: "You don't understand. It's really, really hard to be a kid with red hair. It takes a long time to grow into it. I honestly didn't grow into my hair color until I was 25. Remember, when we saw that movie a few months ago? The one with the spiders? That's when it happened."
Ian: "But... I want us to produce the first child with naturally tan skin and red hair."
Laura: "Ian, that's a fantasy. It's a myth. Like vampires or the Loch Ness Monster or productive Americans. People with dark skin and red hair don't exist."
Ian: "But... I have red hair somewhere back in my gene pool. And I have brown skin. It could happen..."
Laura: "Any child of ours is genetically assured of being timid, bashful, and self-conscious. God, our DNA mixed together? The kid will be a complete hermit. Red hair's just not going to work."
Ian: "But..."
Laura: "And then you have those weirdo men who have red hair fetishes. Gross."
Ian: <Sheepishly> "I was drawn to your red hair from the beginning. Sometimes, I'll wake up early in the morning, right when the light starts streaming through the window, and your hair looks like glistening copper. Then I have trouble going back to sleep because I just want to stare at you."
Laura: <Feels like an ass>
