Happy Valentine's Day, Lady Steed!

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The first time I remember seeing Lady Steed comes some time after she had first noticed me. I was at her apartment for . . . some reason. I was sharing a church assignment with one of her roommates--that was probably why. Lady Steed was sitting at the kitchen table (which abutted the living room) working on a color wheel for her color-theory class.

I sat at the table and talked with her for a while and learned what her name was (though not her last name which name's pronunciation I thus remained unclear on for some time -- being male and 22, it sure looked like it had something to do with feminine undergarments), what she was studying (graphic design), et cetera -- all the basic getting-to-know-you college-style stuff. I tried to appear knowledgeable ("So I see you've noticed that orange and red make, um, orange. Wait.") and we chatted until whoever I was waiting for became available. I showed her my graphic design ideas for promoting a play I was working on and she hated them and told me very clearly that these ideas of mine were very very bad ideas indeed. This would be her first step in turning me into a person with (some) taste.

I'm not precisely sure when our second good conversation was, but fast forward eight months or so and watch me during the week after our first twelve hours spent together on a couch. The tweed jacket I wore that night is covered in long auburn strands and every time I note one, I pick it off and hold it so the light reflects off it and I smile before I let it float away. I smile because of who that hair represents. And because I know that there will be many more such strands in my future.

As it ends up, sometimes those hairs can get to be a little much -- big balls of hair in the baby's fist -- but they still symbolize something beautiful and wonderful, and the person I love more than any other in this great big world.

Lady Steed, I love you. And I still love getting your hair all over my clothes.

Happy Valentine's Day.