The Colour of my Wall

Just finished putting up the painter’s tape and laying old sheets on the hard wood floors of the living room … I’m giving the livingroom walls a fresh coat of paint … much needed as one wall has stood neglected since July when the new bay window was installed.

Yesterday as I was at the paint store staring at the paint chip galleries … I had visions of my livingroom walls giddy with excitement wondering what colour I’d be bathing them in … robin egg’s blue … cloudy charcoal … cuban cigar …. maybe sunkissed white (paint chips have such great names). I can’t blame them really … as the rest of the house walls bear names such as Fresh Melon, Freshwater, Cuban Cigar, Rich Mocha, Moonlight Blue, Tutti Frutti … I think they’re going to be rather disappointed that they’re to be bathed in beige.

Did you know that there are hundreds of shades of beige? I never knew … but I met them all last night at the paint store … Mandolin String, Water Chestnut, Grey Moth, Mystical, Poker Face … rather exotic names for a common colour that is routinely described as … ordinary, run-of-the-mill, generic, unremarkable …I know that if I were a wall I’d be rather insulted that I’d been deemed beige … Beige? (raised eyebrows) … the colour of cargo pants and pantyhose??

“Water Chestnut” is the beige of choice … and as I look down at the paint chip one of those weirdnesses of life stare up at me … english colour name= water chestnut / french colour name= lin antique … translation = antique linen … and that’s a colour of its own within the english colour wheel. So what’s Antique Linen called in French? Water Chestnut? So what’s the logic behind this? Has the paint company decided that French eyes don’t see the colours in the same way as English eyes? …

Speaking of French … beige is ecru … and even the English use the term … especially when trying to downplay the beige-index of whatever they’re trying to describe. I mean, come on … ecru sounds sophisticated, definitely not ordinary …

If I were a wall I could handle ecru … and maybe I could find peace in knowing that my colour brings balance and is the perfect foil to make other colours shine and look their best … that my ecru keeps things light …

But beige, ecru, water chestnuts aside … I’d much prefer to be … (oh my the possibilities are limitless) … Caribbean Blue Water … it’s the colour that makes me comfortable and quiets my internal churnings … What colour is your wall?