Orange Heads

I don’t know why but our society has this thing against the colour orange. In topics that don’t seem to matter orange gets slurred. I don’t know why.

The first time I had an inkling of this was when I was in elementary school and the teacher asked for us to name our favourite colour. The first thing I noticed was that it was an epic struggle between blue and red to see which colour would come out on top. But all the primary and secondary colours got named. Except orange.

As I was one of the very last students to weigh in and really didn’t have a favourite, I felt sorry for orange. So I picked that colour. A month later, when I went shopping, I found a Houston Astros shirt in the colour of orange. So I picked that shirt to buy and wear. That’s about as far as it went.

Eventually I bought my first car. It was cheap, certified, did I mention cheap, had a good crash test rating, and of course it was cheap. It was a Czechoslovakian Skoda. It was pumpkin coloured and the ownership said it was red. This wasn’t confusing because there were only a couple Skoda colours and nothing was closer to red than its pumpkin orange. It wasn’t just me – everybody thought it was orange and because of the rareness of this colour, I could always find it in a parking lot easily.

The naming of redheads is just as stupid as the name of the colour of my Skoda. They are orangeheads in reality. Many redheads have obviously orange hair. And to my eyes, the reddest of the orangeheads have a colour that is closest to orange.

These facts have been muddied by all the hair dyes available. You know the ones like burgundy or even purply reds. These are not natural hair colours. Which is why I am all in favour of the obviously fake colours like blue, purple, or green. People lost the right to complain of unnatural when they allowed the fake red colours to exist.

So how do I get redheads to start making everyone use the term orangeheads? I don’t think I can. Maybe they’ve been told too long that their hair is better than other redheads. It’s really an auburn.

So I think we’re going to have to use a more positive sounding term than either orange or red heads. I suggest flame heads. Wood flames are mostly orange with a tinge of reds and yellows. And we have a positive image of such colours when we’re cosy around the fireplace or campfire.

It’s just that flame head suggests the phrase hot head which is supposed to be someone that is easily angered. And the only redhead stereotype I know is that they are supposed to be hot heads. I give up! Perhaps some redheads could get together and find a true and positive name for their kind. You may not be able to enforce it on everyone but I promise I will comply.