Daughter, Not Like Mother

I’m a color junkie.

If the colors around me aren’t right, I’m not right either.

I get irritable, uneasy, downright sad. With every move, and that’s been a gracious plenty, I immediately collect paint chips and tape them to the walls, watching the effects of sun and lamp light.

I query visitors to see what they see.

This goes on longer than anyone can stand.

Of course, that’s not the end of it either.

More color choices are included--carpet, throw pillows, upholstered furniture, fringe, picture frames, wallpaper. I grew up with a mother who said, “Wherever you sit in a room, you should see something pretty in every direction.”

Cliff, his financial calculator overloading with each decision, believes she didn’t mean this literally.

But I know she did. Afterall, I grew up in her houses.

Now that we’re in our last house, my color choices have extended outside. I never planted bulbs around the other properties because I knew it was only a matter of time until we moved away, abandoning them.

So for several years here, I’ve planted daffodils, snow drops, and tulips. I find this harder than interiors because, unlike my mother, I do not enjoy kneeling and digging in dirt. But it’s required, nevertheless.

I got Maggie involved in catalog selections because it seemed like the right thing to do. I figured purple would be her tulip color.  

She picked black.

Who on earth, except for vampires, considers black a spring color?

Teeth gritted, I planted those bulbs that bloomed recognizably black the first season. Yet this spring, they’re less black and more deep purple with a maroon haze. Still, if you stand far enough away, they pass for black.

She was disappointed but not surprised. How else could anyone mix and match tints to create something so unnatural in a spring flower?

Because motherhood changes the heart and soul of a woman, I told her not to worry. “Sweetheart, I’ll watch the catalogs for your second favorite color: grey.”

I know some eclectic greenhouse will figure it out.

Heaven help me.

I know I’ll order them.