In a Word ... Pink

I was out for a walk the other day. It happens. I almost wished it hadn’t. One of the first people I met was a man wearing pink trousers. He wasn’t even American. Even as men all over the world abase (maybe) themselves on this International Men’s Day for crimes past and present, I still cannot countenance why any man would wear pink trousers.

Except as penance, as reparation, as a reflection of low self-esteem. But that did not seem to be the case. The wearer was a bearded young man of (clearly) confident disposition. I walked on.

Soon, and a little further ahead, I saw a young woman wearing pink shorts with matching phone. It was when I realised my detestation of pink is not gender-specific. I just can’t stand the colour wherever it is worn, or on walls, in that pink triangle used by gay people, or those pink cards, blankets, and clothing for baby girls! As Shakespeare said “... fie on’t”.

Well, he might have.

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It’s such a wishy, washy, neither one thing or the other, fish or foul, colour. It doesn’t seem to be able to make up its mind just what it is. It should be a symbol of procrastination. “Here you are, Lord Hamlet, pink. It illustrates your frame of mind.”

Personally, I’ve always preferred blue (except in politics!). They say green is the most restful colour. For me it’s sky blue. Even as a child I could stare into the great infinity of a blue sky and find therein all consolation.

At university, and for some time after, I had a navy blue coat in which I ate, drank, slept, and lived for many years until it fell apart leaving me bereft. In a previous life it was an FCA coat given me by a friend, which my mother had dyed. In return, some time later, I introduced my friend to the woman who is his wife. It seemed a good deal.

I’ve always liked blue jeans and one year, at the end of a working summer when I usually bought clothes to see me through to the following June, I bought two Arctic blue jumpers which I wore constantly despite an impression I never changed clothes all year. Nobody noticed.

Blue, blue, my world is blue.

Colour, from Latin colour, for “hue” or “appearance”

inaword@irishtimes.com