I'm excited to start a public blog this weekend. I want to name it from Baby Suggs' quote in Toni Morisson's Beloved, "Bring me a little lavender in, if you got any. Pink, if you don't."
Baby Suggs, an older ex-slave retires to her bed to consider something harmless like color because she can't take the cruelty of slavery anymore. "And Sethe (her daughter in law) would oblige her with anything from fabric to her own tongue...Took her a long time finish with blue, then yellow, then green. She was well into pink when she died."
There is something so moving to me about both the concept of considering color and bringing someone color in any way you can, from using the insides of your body to the faded edge of your sleeve. I love the ingenious meditation and creative love.
Over the past year, I have retreated to my bed across the US, the Caribbean and Europe to process the changes around me. Feelings of joy and desperation have poured out across my computer keys--or the tiny buttons on my blackberry. The only direction to my writing being a search for truth about my human condition.
I'm leaving the boys alone (with their Coach) for the first time since they moved in and going to stay at dear Leese's house in the middle of nowhere, Vermont. I will be considering color, not to escape the cruelty of the world, but to find the best way to illustrate my personal kaleidoscope.
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