The Carpet Matches the Drapes

Why I searched for a guy is a question I turn over in the weird insomniac hours when I awake at four a.m. to recycle the diet coke with caffeine I drank at school. Getting up to use the bathroom, my body says, “Hey Redhead, I’m wired! Let’s toss and turn.” That’s how caffeine works. When I am thirsty in the middle of the day, I am not good at thinking about insomnia in the middle of the night. I am teaching creative writing which leaves little time for restocking the office fridge with caffeine-free soda purchased at Target by the case (and therefore cheaper than campus vending machines) and too much theoretical knowledge to apply to this question of why I want a man. Not just A man, but THE man, and not only that, but ANOTHER man.
For as Tiina is wont to point out, I have been down the aisle before, albeit the institutional-tiled hallway of the county courthouse with the judge’s secretary for a witness at the chronological age of 21. Tiina has yet to marry though she has been in long-term relationships and has an adorable son possessed of long limbs, blond hair, and brilliant eyes just like her. I am the mother of two teenaged daughters. Neither has red hair, and one of my earliest parenting disasters resulted when I told people who complimented me on their cherubic smiles in line to buy Barbie dolls at Kmart that I had a blonde and a brunette, and had I tried one more time I might have gotten a redhead too. I made this remark one too many times when Kimberly, my brunette, confided later to me at home that she wished she had red hair for me. As if I would change anything about her.
Thus I, of all people, should not be surprised that someone doesn’t want a red head, knowing that hair color matters so little when it comes to loving another person. Still, I am always delighted when someone responds to my profile and they targeted me specifically for the reason that I have red hair. It always reminds me of my husband’s reaction the first time we were together, how his eyebrows shot up and his eyes bulged and he said “My God! You’re a redhead down here too.”
“What color did you think it would be?” I asked him.
“Brown. Just like all the blondes have.”
Years afterward, when I related this experience to Tiina, she wanted to know why I didn’t ask him how many blondes that had been exactly. It never occurred to me to ask, and I cannot wish for a time machine to go back and keep us apart, because every time I think of being in marital hell, I also think of those two girls, one blonde, one brunette, and I have to unwish it.