I am a fan of color. I am not an all-white and neutrals kind of girl, not often prone to sticking with ‘burbs beige. I get into a palette of colors and am energized. I call it inspiration, but my hubby calls it psychedelic… and overwhelming. Please don’t encourage him, by the way – he doesn’t need any help.
I tell people that we have never in our years together opened a paint can that there wasn’t at least a little gasp and a shaking of his head or rubbing his forehead. He looks at me the same way every time – that “you can’t be serious” look, usually followed with a conversation that starts with, “You can’t be serious. Did you even look at the paint after they mixed it???”
As I try to reassure him that it’ll be fine, he is not convinced. He’s thinking we’re about to find ourselves living in a bowling alley birthday party room, which is awesome and festive but perhaps a bit over stimulating over the long haul. The whole first coat is spent on what is by now a pretty well-rehearsed back and forth. “I don’t think this is right.”
“Sure it is, we’ll love it.”
“But what if we hate it?”
“That’s certainly possible.”
“You’re not helping. Seriously, what if it’s awful?”
“We paint over it.”
“You’re killing me. Seriously killing me.”
“Paint is cheap; it’s low risk. We’re going for it.”
Thankfully for me, it usually works out. From the burgundy bedroom circa 1995 (that took four SLOW coats to even out) to the red hutch in our dining room to the poppy colored bathroom two years ago, he’s seen an awful lot of color come into our lives. And 90% of the time, he has ended up a fan. Not always immediately, sometimes it takes a minute to grow on him.
He even likes the poppy, which I admit, had me a little worried. After the first coat, it was so bright that it reflected an orange-y glow onto the adjacent hallway wall that made it look like we had a neon bar sign in there. I looked down the hallway thinking for a moment we might have a scene from Backdraft in progress. I wavered for a brief moment, considering how we might have overshot a smidgen. But once we finished getting the mirror back up and the shower curtain & towels in there, it came together fine. A little more powder room, a lot less Saturday night singing karaoke in our guest shower. All good in the end.
There was that one very unfortunate mustard gold color in the hallway… take my advice, your smartphone is good for many things but displaying paint chips accurately is not one of them. Yikes. Just trust me. I couldn’t wait to get that bad little deal fixed.
So when we recently painted several rooms at our house, and I said I wanted Tidewater on the ceiling, he thought, “Here we go again. Willy Wonka, here we come.”
And now that it’s done? He loves it, and so do I.
The personal growth “bit” here? I guess part of it is remembering that adding a pop of literal and figurative color to our lives is a good thing here and there, just to keep things interesting. You don’t always know what will end up inspiring you. Give it a shot, go for the gold. I mean, you’ll get an ugly mustard colored hallway every now and then, and if you hate it, you fix it with a new pop of color. Maybe not ‘burbs beige though… some other cool color of the rainbow. Yeaaaaaaahh, now we’re talking.