Beautiful in Red

My husband and I have been together since we were 15 years old. Now I have always been the tomboy, never wearing make-up and rarely doing anything with my hair beyond a ponytail. I had always wanted to try dying my hair red so the year after we were married I decided to dye it for our Valentine's Day date. I went to the store and with the help of my best friend purchased a well known brand of hair dye. After an entire day of preparing, we were ready to dye my newly cut hair. Unfortunately having never dyed my hair before, I did not understand that you should always strand test a new dye before using it. My friend, who frequently dyed her hair, claims to this day that she just never thought of it because she had been dying her hair so long. So with much anticipation we towel dry my hair and I put my glasses back on. To my utter surprise, my head is now an odd purplish red. It got even better when out in the sunlight because the sun would reflect off the highlights and then it looked a bit more like a neon purplish aura surrounding my face.

Imagine the look on my husband's face when the day before Valentine's he comes home to his normally no frills wife and she has a purple hairdo that cannot be undone. I was utterly depressed. The morning of Valentine's I really did not want to get up and go to work to show everyone my new do, but I drag myself out of bed and get to the office almost a hour late. As soon as walked in the door, my boss runs up to me and is all smiles. Sitting on my desk is a dozen red roses in a lovely crystal vase. As I read the card, all I could do was grin. It read "Beautiful even in red. Happy Valentine's Day".

My husband and I have been married 14 years. We have seen a lot of Valentine's Day, but I do not think we will ever top how wonderful I felt that first year. Its amazing how beautiful you can feel when you know someone truly sees beyond the outside and loves you for what you really are.