All Colours, Especially Purple

My View as I Write this Post 

When I volunteered to do some more guest writing for the Dead Good Blog and received the list of topics, the first title that came up was ‘colour.’ I ticked it, confident that I could write about a subject that dominates my world. It was only when Steve responded that I realised it had to be done by the following day - and I had a pretty busy 24 hours ahead of me.  Luckily, my guest spot was quickly moved to Sunday, so here I am, back again.

My love of colour goes back a long way. I don’t know what sparked it, as our house, when I was little, was mainly magnolia with a splash of white, a neutral background to all the colourful goings on, perhaps.  I do remember one episode of redecorating that, with hindsight, was certainly rather odd. With three young children tearing about the house the magnolia in the front room began to get extremely grubby around the light switch and below, where sticky fingers would rest whilst the door was opened.  Dad (or was it mum? I think they were both involved in the end) decided to brush over the marks with some leftover paint, which unfortunately didn’t bear much resemblance to the original colour.  It started with a small area around the light switch.  Whoever was painting stood back and looked at the completed work.  And decided it wasn’t completed after all. It needed to cover the grubby fingerprints below.  Painting was continued, with frequent pauses to survey the handiwork.  After an hour or so it was decided that the job was done.
 

There was a large ovalish area, measuring approximately a metre from top to bottom. It became known as The Egg, and it soon fitted in beautifully with all the other slightly bizarre repairs in the house.  None of us really noticed it after a couple of days, and we were only reminded of it when visitors did a double take and silently mouthed, ‘What - ?’ as they entered the room. 

When Dave and I got our own first house in the 1970s we decided magnolia was the devil, and instantly set about decorating each room in the darkest colours we could find: deep brown, rich red, green, orange and purple. In our defence they were the ‘in’ colours at the time, but I don’t think the in-laws saw it that way.  My mother in law had already practically had a nervous breakdown when I’d requested bright red and royal blue bedding as wedding presents.  She might have been more impressed if she’d known then that we’d still be sleeping in them forty four years later. 

I’d like to say I’ve grown up a bit since then, and now enjoy a restful, magnolia house.  Somehow this hasn’t happened and we’re still wallowing in purple, yellow and bright red rooms.  In fact, when our children were little we always referred to the ‘Red Room’ and the ‘Blue Room,’ not ‘The Lounge,’ and the ‘Dining Room,’ like normal people. My clothes are arranged in the wardrobe in colour order, my shoes go from black to purple to blue to red, and my socks genuinely bring me joy when I open the drawer. Pretty sad when I think about it.

I can’t leave this post without mentioning  the colourful, ever changing palette upon my head - an ongoing experiment with style and colour for the past 53 years.  I was lucky to have a mum who was pretty liberal about these things, well ahead of her time, and didn’t think it odd when I appeared one morning, at the age of thirteen with a full head of grey hair. To be honest it was an experiment that had gone slightly wrong, but, undaunted, off I went to my rather staid Grammar School, only to be singled out in assembly and sent home to ‘sort it out.’ 

By the time I’d had a few more colours (always a reckless experiment) I think the school had given up on me, and apart from the odd, sarcastic comment most of the teachers inwardly sighed and turned a blind eye. Since then I’ve probably sported every colour of the rainbow. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. Like the time I didn’t leave the bleach on long enough and ended up with bright orange hair (well before it was in fashion). I looked like Dick Emery in drag. My daughter (aged seven) sobbed and begged me to wear a hat when I picked her up from school the next day.  If I remember rightly, I found a hairdresser who had the skills to at least dumb down the brightness, although I still wore the hat as requested. 

Purple by Jill Reidy

It was the purple ink 

Siphoned carefully 

Into a new, expensive pen

I watched as it filled

The light cutting through the colour 

Wiped the nib on a rag 

Replaced the casing

Screwed back on the lid 

Felt it heavy in my hand 

It signified something

I wasn’t sure what

The end

Or the Beginning 

Whatever

Purple was the colour

My colour 

From now on

Thanks for reading,   Jill