Colo(u)rs

 

"Mo-THER, Mo-THER, Mo-HER," my daughter said complete with eye rolls. She was in her 40s and no longer a teenager but was responding to my showing her how how the blue in our click-clack (French for a type of couch) exactly matched a blue in the needlepoint copy of one of the Cluny tapestries she'd done for me.

I admit colo(u)r effects me. For example: Almost all the cars in France and Switzerland are white, grey, black or beige. Maybe not totally depressing, but at best sad and very BORING. I don't care if it's a clunker or a luxury car costing as much as a mansion. 

Every now and then there is a colo(u)red car among that sea of swill. 

When we had a beige car, we decorated it with several blue butterfly stickers. It also made the car stand out in garages, and I suspect a car thief would not want something so easily identifiable. 

When I see a red car, I smile. A blue car and I suspect maybe a swatch of sky decided to cover the car. Green brings up vegetation thoughts. And if I'm very lucky, I will see a copper-colored car. 

I decorate my black laptop. It gives me a warm feeling when I close it at the end of the day and hope that it will be a good writing day when I open it in the morning whereas just a black surface -- well Yuck!

Sometimes black and white colors aren't boring. Each morning the first thing I see is the painting my beloved husband bought for me because he knew I liked it. The artist has captured the water falling so realistically I can almost feel the spray from my bed. I wonder where the woman is heading.  

Color is memory. Waiting for a friend to pick me up, I glanced up. An almost deep blue sky peeked thru the green leaves, but there was a variety of greens because of the way the sun illuminated near the top. It reminded me of a dish/tea towel my late friend Mardy had given me when my daughter was a baby. Those greens and blues were prominent along with some different shades of purple.

Spring is wonderful with all its colored flowers. Looking at the purple of an iris, I found a bee going about its daily chores gathering pollen. 

As a writer I use colo(u)r words sparingly while still trying to give my readers a feel of the scene. Fog does not need the word grey to describe it. Mowed grass does not need the word green, but it can conjure up the colo(u)r green as well as the smell of newly cut grass.

 Note: colo(u)r is used as the result of a conversation with Brit friends on differences in spelling of English-English and American-English.