yet at the end of the day, I still don’t know your favourite colour.
I just came back from reading this beautiful piece by sawndcheck, and the feeling of missing you hit me stronger than usual because I just realised that unlike her, I don’t even have the luxury to know you long enough to find out your favourite colour.
We were once so close that at one point, I thought I know you more than anyone else I ever cared about. I used to secretly be so proud of that fact because you’re such a popular guy, yet I know so many details that you’d only share with me when we used to text every single day.
Sure, I know what your usual coffee order, and the model of your dream car. I know how you like your laundry done, and your favourite brand of beer. Why am I so hung up over the fact that I don’t know your favourite colour?
“It’s weird to feel like you miss someone you’re not even sure you know.” — David Foster Wallace, Infinite Jest
I think it’s because one’s favourite colour is such a basic and classic “get-to-know-me” question that is often overused in icebreakers. I know no one REALLY cares about it, but it sounds like one of those questions that people would ask on awkward first dates when there’s nothing else the two of you have in common.
It irked me to not know your favourite colour because it made me feel as if I missed out on a very superficial yet fundamental piece of you, and that I’ll never have the chance of ever finding out ever again. I can’t just casually text you about it, or hang out with you long enough to observe the underlying colour trends in the things you wear or buy.
Do I really care about your favourite colour, or do I just feel annoyed that I don’t have any rights/means of finding this menial, useless information about you anymore? I defintely think it’s the latter, because I’d rather die than hear from someone else what your favourite colour is, because hearing it from others mean that they’re now in my shoes, back when I still had such a close connection with you.
I keep thinking about hypothetical situations in which someone would (somehow) ask me if I know what your favourite colour is, and I could imagine how disappointed I’d get that I can’t even answer such a simple, stupid question. How dare I claim we used to be close? How laughable that she thinks she knows him so well, when she doesn’t even know such a simple thing about him?
It really isn’t about colours at the end of the day, is it? All of these thoughts and rants always end up leading back to the same root cause: you. Regardless of what your favourite colour is, I hope you’re surrounded by it always. Whatever the colour, it’ll probably look amazing on you anyway.
