Finding the Color Back

At some point, did everything get... gray?

Not literally.

Well, maybe a little literally.

Black. White. Gray. Beige. Clean lines. Matching sets. Same cup. Same kitchen. Same furniture. Same restaurants. Same everything.

And none of it is bad.

That’s the weird part.

A lot of it looks really nice.

But somewhere along the way, I think we got so good at making everything clean, current, convenient and universally appealing that we started losing some of the little details that made things feel like ours.

That’s the “color” I keep trying to put words to.

Not a literal color.

Not a branding color.

Not some forced “signature thing” you decide to adopt because somebody online told you everybody needs one.

I mean the little pieces of personality that collect around a person over time.

The things you don’t necessarily plan.

The things you keep reaching for.

The things other people start associating with you before you even realize they have.

Maybe you wear bold eyeglass frames because the safe ones bore you.

Maybe you found an old grain-dealer Thermos mug from the 90s at a garage sale and somehow it became your favorite to-go cup instead of the giant modern Stanley everybody else is hauling around.

Maybe you have a favorite hammer.

Maybe your socks are never plain.

Maybe you always wear deep burgundy lipstick.

Maybe you keep buying weird little things from antique stores that make no sense to anybody else but somehow make perfect sense to you.

That’s what I mean.

The stuff that sneaks into your life because you like it.

Not because it matches.

Not because it’s trending.

Not because somebody decided it was the thing everyone needed this year.

Just because it feels like you.

And I wonder when we started questioning those little preferences so much.

We’re constantly told what is timeless.

What is professional.

What is flattering.

What is modern.

What will increase resale value.

What looks expensive.

What photographs well.

What everybody else is buying.

It’s almost like every decision has to pass through an invisible committee before we’re allowed to make it.

Does this match?

Is it practical?

Is it too much?

Will I get tired of it?

What will people think?

Sometimes I think we’ve forgotten that “I just like it” is still a perfectly acceptable reason to choose something.

Maybe your color isn’t something you own at all.

Maybe it’s where you stop to eat.

You could drive through ten towns and stop at the same chain restaurant every single time.

Same menu.

Same booths.

Same packaging.

Same exact meal you could have had 500 miles away.

Or you could pull off the highway, head into town and find the little diner.

The place with the squeaky booths and laminated menus.

The waitress who calls everybody honey.

The same four old men sitting at the counter who have apparently been conducting an unofficial town meeting every morning since 1987.

The place where your burger comes with a little extra grease and probably a few extra teaspoons of love.

I’d pick that place.

Because at least when I leave, I feel like I was somewhere.

There’s color in that.

There’s history.

There’s evidence that people have actually lived there.

Maybe that’s what we’re missing.

Things that feel lived in.

We replace things before they ever get worn in.

We renovate things before they ever collect a story.

We throw out the scratched table.

Replace the old cup.

Update the kitchen.

Swap the chair.

Modernize something that wasn’t really broken.

And yes, sometimes things need replaced.

Sometimes the old chair really is one broken spring away from launching somebody across the room.

But not everything needs to be improved into something unrecognizable.

Sometimes the scratch is part of the story.

Sometimes the worn spot is there because somebody sat there for twenty years.

Sometimes the old mug is better because your hand already knows it.

Sometimes the cabinet with six layers of paint has more personality than the brand-new one ever could.

Color takes time.

That might be the difference.

You can buy a trend this afternoon.

Color usually has to accumulate.

The old mug becomes your mug because you keep reaching for it.

The little diner becomes your place because you keep going back.

The chair becomes your chair because everybody knows where you’re going to sit.

The windchime becomes home because you’ve heard it through a hundred summer evenings.

A recipe becomes yours because somewhere along the way the measurements disappeared and now you just know.

A back road becomes your route because you’ve driven it through every season and know exactly which hill gives you the best view.

Maybe your color is that you always read the historical markers.

Maybe you slow down for old barns.

Maybe you wonder who lived in the abandoned house and where they went.

Maybe you stop at antique stores without actually needing anything.

Maybe you send handwritten birthday cards.

Maybe you still make your signature fancy because you think signatures should have personality.

Maybe you always have flowers on the kitchen table.

Maybe you know the cashier’s name.

Maybe you wave at people.

Maybe you make too much food because the thought of somebody leaving your house hungry is apparently unbearable.

Maybe there is a windchime on your porch that makes a sound you could recognize anywhere.

Maybe you keep the ugly chair.

Maybe you crank the same songs you loved at seventeen.

Maybe you have one phrase your kids hear so often they’ll probably catch themselves saying it twenty years from now and immediately think of you.

That’s color too.

And honestly, I think that’s the part that matters most.

Because when you think about the people you really love, what do you remember?

Usually it isn’t whether their house was perfectly coordinated.

It’s the details.

Grandma always had those candies.

Dad always grabbed that hammer.

Mom always wore those glasses.

Grandpa always drank out of that old cup.

She always took that road.

He always sat in that chair.

She always made too much food.

He always said that thing.

You remember the smell of their house.

The sound of a screen door.

A song they played.

The way they signed their name.

The cup they used.

The chair they sat in.

The restaurant they always picked.

Tiny things.

And somehow those tiny things become huge once the person isn’t standing there anymore.

They become little shortcuts back to them.

That’s why I don’t think this is really about stuff.

It’s about fingerprints.

Evidence that you were here.

That you had preferences.

That you loved certain things.

That something made you laugh.

That something made you stop.

That you didn’t spend your entire life choosing only what was practical, safe, neutral and universally approved.

Maybe that’s why the gray bothers me.

Not because gray is ugly.

I actually like gray.

But when everything is gray, straight-lined, polished, optimized and exactly like the next thing, where does the person go?

Where does the story go?

Where does the weird little detail live?

Where’s the thing that makes somebody walk into a room and say, “Oh, this is so you”?

Maybe finding the color back doesn’t require some huge reinvention.

Maybe we don’t need to become more interesting.

Maybe we just need to stop editing ourselves so much.

Pay attention to what you reach for.

What makes you linger.

What you love for no logical reason.

What you’ve kept.

What you always choose.

What your friends send you because they immediately thought of you.

What your kids might someday finish with:

“Mom always...”

“Dad always...”

“Grandma always...”

Maybe wear the bold glasses.

Use the old mug.

Keep the favorite hammer.

Buy the weird thing at the garage sale.

Take the back road.

Stop at the diner.

Hang the windchime.

Wear the lipstick.

Keep the chair.

Sign your name with the flourish.

Let something in your life exist simply because you love it.

Because somewhere along the way, the world got really good at giving us black, white, gray and straight lines.

Maybe we just need to put a little life back into them.

A little history.

A little personality.

A little weirdness.

A few more fingerprints.

A little more color.

Maybe yours never actually disappeared.

Maybe you’ve just been surrounded by gray long enough that you forgot to look for it.

Find it back.