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Illustration by Catherine Chan
Smack in the middle of the most frigid and gloomy month of the year comes Valentine’s Day. With its crimson hearts and roses, it makes February, for a short time, bearable. Red is my favourite colour, so this holiday is my mid-winter mood booster.
As a redhead growing up, I was cautioned by my mother to avoid wearing any shade of red. She was probably right; it’s not the most flattering colour for a redhead. So, avoid it I did. But I still adored all kinds of reds. Red can be warm, welcoming, cheerful and emphatic, and I loved surrounding myself with it.
One of the first purchases my husband and I made in our first home was a custom-made red wool sofa. I loved that couch passionately, feeling its warm red embrace every time I sank into it to read the paper or drink a glass of wine (a bold red, of course). I wasn’t even deterred when a decorator we were interviewing entered the living room and exclaimed, “Get off that couch! You should never be seen on it as long as you have that hair!” (He didn’t get the job.)
Red décor was not something you saw in my childhood home. There were so many better colours that wouldn’t clash with the four redheaded children rumbling around inside. Despite our Irish, English and Scottish heritage, red hair had not been prominent in any of our documented family histories, so I doubt our dark-haired parents were expecting a ginger onslaught.
My siblings didn’t seem to be particularly bothered by the redhead teasing but I hated being called Carrots, Punkinhead, Freckle Face or Ginger. My parents tried to convince me that these were just awkward endearments, but my resultant fits of “Irish temper” just added fuel to the fire. As my Grade 5 teacher read us Anne of Green Gables, I wondered if headstrong Anne Shirley had, like me, used her birthday candle wishes to beg for dark, wavy hair.
When I was eight, my family went to Ireland for a few months to visit our grannie. It was a relief to see, from my perch on the top of a double-deckered bus in Dublin, what seemed like a sea of redheads on the streets below, all of them seemingly happy with their fate (and nary a one wearing red).
My first departure from the “no red” rule came when I purchased a pair of red shoes while in university. From an ever-obedient daughter, this could have been considered an act of rebellion. A burgundy coat followed. Adding red to my wardrobe could have got really out of control if I hadn’t been treated to a session with a colourist. I went to her studio and, after inspecting my hair and skin and brown eyes, she sided with my mother: earth tones were most flattering and my “seasonal” colour was definitely autumn. That meant she wanted me to banish navy blue and black from my closet, and also those offending red shoes. If I had hoped for some sort of colour liberation, I was disappointed.
She sold silk scarves too, and I fingered one longingly. “Yes, that is beautiful,” she said, as she saw me holding one silk with tones of purple, taupe and navy, “but it can’t be yours.”
My husband, bless him, went in the next week and bought it anyway. I still grin when I wear that scarf.
My years in the autumn colour jail ended when my hair changed as I aged (fading, as red does, to a blend of cream and white). My colour palette was freed at last. My closet is now a riot of previously verboten colours, such as fuschia, purple, pink and navy, and a painter’s palette of reds. Some of my favourites are a poppy red toque, crimson gloves, a vermillion purse, a maroon jacket, and a ruby red helmet to match the ruby red bike in my garage. Rust, olive green and burnt umber have all been sent to the donation bin around the corner.
Where I miss seeing red is in the mirror. Just when we’d finally become friends, my red hair and I have parted ways. The loved ones in my adult life had convinced me to embrace my hair and celebrate its uniqueness. Now I have a new me to contend with.
Joni Mitchell sings, “You don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone.”
As I look at old photos of my redheaded years, I think emphatically, “Amen to that.”
Judith Butler lives in Toronto.
