Life in Color
I’ve always been a visual learner. The kind of kid who needed to see things, not hear about them. The kid who doodled in her notes and color coded everything — three-ring binders, tabs, etc. In my senior year of high school I took AP art history. The class used a thick textbook that spanned the entire history of art — dating back to the drawings made by cavemen. I don’t know how it happened, but when I took tests and recalled information, I could clearly see the image in the textbook, down to what position on the page I had seen it on. It’s no wonder I ended up getting a 5 on the AP exam. A photographic memory of sorts.
Have you heard of eidetic memory? Some people think it’s a myth. Others think it’s a rare gift. But basically, the way those who experience it describe it, it’s retaining an image in the mind long after you’ve seen it. For example, you can stare at a picture for 30 seconds but then continue “seeing” it after the physical picture is taken away. That’s how my mind processes images. Especially color. It clings to my memory and in some cases, I just can’t shake it loose.
In October of 2012, my mother was intubated and placed in intensive care. Her organs were failing her. She had been a diabetic for twenty years, and the disease had severely damaged her kidneys. She was on dialysis three times a week for three years. Her kidneys had received the first fatal blow, now the rest of her body was giving up. The week leading up to her death, which began on the day I turned 35, I went to visit her at the hospital every evening.
The room was dimly lit in yellow hues. The breathing machine hissed in a corner. Her skin was thin and wrinkled, like crumpled tissue paper. She was conscious, but couldn’t talk because of the tube in her mouth. Her eyes did their best to speak. There was an intense fear there. She held my hand and squeezed it. Her nails were a stark contrast to the white sheets. They were a hot pink — nearly neon. Barbie doll nails.
She’s been gone nearly eight years but when I close my eyes, I can still see that color, so vibrant, so full of life, even though she was dying. And how appropriate, I think, because she was the kind of person who forced a smile even in her deepest pain. She was dying, and yet when the nurse asked her how she was doing, she shook her hand back and forth — a “so-so” gesture. My mother. Ever the optimist.
There’s another color that I have vivid memories of. My father had a red tool box, and for some reason, whenever I think of him, that’s what comes to mind.
When he fixed things around the house, he wore a white T-shirt, cutoff jean shorts, and worn out white sneakers. He’d sit on the floor, the red tool box in front of him between his legs. It was the color of a shiny candy apple. He’d search for the right tool, metal clinking as he’d finally pull out what he needed. A wrench. Or a screwdriver. Dad the builder.
He had a heart attack. Two heart attacks. The first one happened when I was eight years old. But it was the second one that killed him. I was 14 years old. It happened on the night Hurricane Andrew hit South Florida, ravishing everything in its path. It’s been nearly 30 years since he’s been gone. Most of my memories of him have faded to sepia tones.
But not that red tool box. Or the white of his hair. The blue of his eyes.
