YELLOW

As the days of January pass by, it is time for me to be alert to the colour yellow. Don't get me wrong, I like the colour yellow and the joy it brings, but I have had issues with the colour. To be truthful I find the colour a bit pushy and lots sneaky.

This is a dull time of year, for my old farmhouse on the cliff. It overlooks a small working fishing village, on the Bay of Fundy. The lobster boats are resting until spring, pulled up on shore, lolling on the pebble beach. Some of their beauty and majesty doesn't come ashore with them. The days are short and the windows of the summer occupants are dark. In defiance of the darkness, a string of small coloured lights dangles over the opening of the front porch. I love the daffodils, who will continue their winter dreaming, for many weeks ahead. At this time I am vulnerable to yellow.

My older daughter was born in late November, many years ago. That Christmas our house in the city was laden down with edible delights of all sorts. As the new year began, I felt fat, probably because I was a little fat. There just seemed to be so much more of me. The easiest solution I could come up with, was to discover a new piece of clothing, whose wearing would make me feel a little more comfortable.

Off I went on the the streetcar, to Eaton's Department Store. I left the grey, slushy street and entered through the polished  brass doors. I touched the shiny toe of the oversized bronze statue of Timothy Eaton, as he sat in his oversized bronze chair, hoping for a little Methodist luck, as my mother, her mother and my great grandmother had done before me. Then it was up two elevator rides to the Ladies Fashion Floor.

My grown daughters call me shopping impaired. I have a tendency to take a short stroll through the displayed items, make a fairly quick choice and then head awkwardly to the  changing rooms.
In the early seventies, in still staid Toronto, this was a rather formal event. A matronly woman was always interested in fashion choices. She frequently popped her head into the room to make sure everything was going tickedy-boo. It wasn't, but I certainly didn't want her to know. I didn't want to have a heart to heart about how I felt in a rather expensive, one hundred percent polyester, shiny, spring pant suit. I just wanted to be out of there.

I paid for my parcel and left it with them to be delivered the next day. On the way out, I bought a pair of colourful sandals that would complete the outfit. The pantsuit was vibrant yellow.

The next day my package arrived. I was startled by the contents but decided I needed a spot of yellow to perk up my otherwise drab wardrobe. I was far too young to begin the path to matronhood. I still had my long braids, a vestige of the disappearing sixties.

Spring came, flower gardens flourished, and the sun shone. I went out into the creating world in  my gasp of yellow, feeling very much a wilted yellow tulip. Back in I went, to change into my comforting blue denim and brown cordoroy, that graciously covered my bigger self. I carried out a bundle of smiling sunshine in her bright orange tie dyed  crossover undershirt.