Monday, January 12, 2009

The Color Purple

Even though I wear black most of the time, I suppose my favorite color is purple. I write with purple pens in a purple planner, have had purple hair, love purple and black striped tights, and if something comes in a variety of colors - I always pick the purple version.

For quite some time, I have tried to figure a way to have some sort of panel or strip that runs the length of the tables in my Craft room. My first idea was metal so that I could stick magnets to it to hold up all my "ideas." It seemed logical, my guy is a metal artist and we have metal all over the house. But metal, the kind magnets stick to is expensive and heavy. I wanted thin. After pricing the thinnest I could find in large panels, I quickly decided it wasn't going to happen.

Then a brilliant discovery - magnetic paint! We had some leftovers from the panels we surfaced our work tables with. Wow! Nothing to cut - they're perfect. I painted the panels with 3 coats of the magnetic paint. I still can't get over how well it works. I commented to several friends about choosing a topcoat for the panels. The unanimous response was "Black or purple?" Funny! I suppose I am that predictable. I have a scrapbooking paper that I love, it's greens and blues, kinda Retro and very calming. And so not me.

While scanning through me massive amount of image files on my computer, I saw the labels I made long time ago for the Craft Cave. It hit me like a ton of bricks. It's so me. Black, white, purple, and lime green. The design itself is sort of nutty, it reminds me of a old circus freak show. My craft room is its own little circus. Perfect.

This is the design for the panels. I wanted to keep the basic idea from the labels but change it a little, a tad more dramatic. Then I decided that I should do something about the poor excuse for a window covering in there. I have a tacky lace panel up there now draped with a Mardi Gras feather boa. Besides the fact that it's ugly, it doesn't do much for privacy. So I quickly came up with an idea for a valance and curtains for the room carrying forward the "Big Top" theme.

I hauled the panels outside to prep them for airbrushing. Ugh. Since the magnetic paint is slightly textured, my friskets won't stick to them. Plan B - masking tape! I was about halfway done when the once bright blue sky turned black. I scrambled to get everything back in the house before the deluge. I have the worse luck, I swear!

While I was outside taping my panels, someone drove by with their radio up kinda loud. The music was probably Cajun or Zydeco but the melody struck a familiar chord in my head. I started smiling and singing softly to myself, "Start wearing purple, wearing purple. Start wearing purple for me now. All your sanity and wits, they will all vanish, I promise. It's just a matter of time. I've known you since you were a twenty. I was twenty. And thought that some years from now, a purple little little lady will be perfect for dirty old and useless clown." The song took up residence in my head for the rest of the day. Wacky song, wacky head. Perfect fit. I contemplated the color purple while humming along, the correspondences, cultural significance, and other forms of synchronicity. I'm just a purple girl in the Freak Show of Life.



2 comments:

  1. i ALMOST did ultra-violet purple this weekend for my roots, but ended up doing midnight blue! remember when i briefly had purple bangs?

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  2. Since I'm allergic to hair dye and the only brand of demi-permanent dye that doesn't send me to the emergency room (or the morgue) stopped making purple - I'm forced to stick with basic black. I liked your hair when you had the purple bangs! Blue is my second fave for "oddball" hair color.

    People in the town I used to live in still call my son "El Pitufo" - the Smurf even though he hasn't had blue hair in years!

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