A Golden Start
Renee Oh
November 19, 2022
Green is not the color of a leaf. The leaves are yellow with a tint of baby blue, and their glossy tips are colors of light. Sometimes, that color is an orange blur of people waking up, the bright white of students playing soccer during lunch, or a gentle carmine of the strenuous way back home. They are the refuge of little flying wings under the streetlamp, the destination of heavy footsteps of departing lovers, and a lighthouse securing its place on the stormiest night. They are always near us, occupying the space of neglect. When you rub them with your fingers, you can tell that the bottom is the True part of the leaves, even though the top bears the most attention. While the top is soft and tender, the bottom parts of the leaves are harsh, ticklish, ugly with scratches made by the bugs eating them little by little, and dark from the shadows always dawning upon them. But they are the wounded warriors that endured the severe summer thunderstorm and heavy winter snow. We never see the bottom of the leaves. But we can sense them.Orange is the color of my sorrow. It is my disgust, jealousy, and wanting. It is also endless sunsets, perpetual survival, an urge to burn myself and show it to the world, circles on the ground from twirling in a sundress under the burning August sun, and your cheeks glowing in the dark. Orange sorrow is the long silence after I asked you when you were coming back to school. Orange sorrow is me waiting for you to call me first for two years. Orange sorrow is my first kiss with you in front of the Walling House, ugly and torturous and beautiful. Orange sorrow is deprivation, the essence of humanity, what makes me feel human — what I have, I want more, and what I lack, I must have. It is my greed and my lack. Orange asks me why I hate it so much when so many things I love are orange. Orange sorrow is when I reply “my love is why I hate you”.Green is the color of your sorrow. You hate green, and I tell you I feel the same. Fun fact: green was once my favorite color. Green is what once was our uniforms — now only mine — the straw in a fragile plastic coffee cup, a freshly mowed lawn that could be seen from your dorm room, twinkling dust particles on your PlayStation, and the plastic wrapper of the fig bar you ate for every single meal because you were too scared to go to the dining hall. Green sorrow is the countless nights you locked yourself in the closet. Green sorrow is their laughter when you were being beaten up. Green sorrow is how you grin: tear-filled dents in your pale pink cheeks, a bump stop on your face, where your green tears reside. Green sorrow is your confession. It is me watching them now, still calling you their friend. Green sorrow is what cannot be taken back, the wound in your heart that changed the world. Green sorrow is neverending; it will be here even after a thousand years, floating in the air without corrupting our bodies, a parasite that devours the world. Your green sorrow is the only color I cannot find beauty in. Yet, your green sorrow is what people think makes up the leaves. But this is not the caseWhite is the color of my happiness. It is the frilly dresses of late May, your eyes gleaming in the dark, the streetlamps we walked by after Study Hall every weeknight, my socks, and your shirt, soft and crisp and smeared in brown from your chocolate bar. My white happiness is cheese-colored cats, me watching the squirrels in the back of Seymour Hall, the fur slowly growing on my dog’s back, and the blooming of magnolia flowers in my backyard like the growing roots of Mom’s shiny hair. It is my favorite word, sonoluminescence, bubbles of white lights floating, collapsing, and transmitting. White is the anticipation of finally seeing you after two years. My white happiness is Bozeman, Seoul, Hudson, and 5,607 miles. White is my trivial happiness, and luckily for us, my white happiness is never-ending, just like your green sorrow.Pink is the color of your happiness. Your pink happiness is your favorite tie, my knitting yarn sitting on your bed, the vitamin gummies you used to take, and the backpack you got me for my birthday. It is your ears when I told you I liked you two years — almost three — ago, numerous facetime calls from Montana, and the paws of your dog Ted. It is also your mom, sister, and dad. Your pink happiness is how much I miss you. Your pink happiness is my orange sorrow; they are similar colors, sitting next to each other on the color wheel, once having defined something — but now meaningless. My orange sorrow is also how much I miss you. Pink is the yearning, and it is beautiful. And maybe that is why it is yours, not mine. Purple is the color of my anger. I admit I am almost always angry. Purple anger is the kind that drives me crazy but makes you feel comfortable. It is the reason for my superficial neglect, the cover of your journal, the 7:00 PM alarm on your phone, our little game where we used to name all the synonyms of joy, and tiny wet teardrops on your blue blanket. Purple anger is ugly, but you shouldn’t mistake this for my orange sorrow. Purple anger can be replaced with many colors, but orange sorrow cannot be replaced. Purple anger sometimes comes in orange sorrow, red secret, or even white happiness. But orange sorrow does not. And together, theycompose the stunning color of the glistening tips of leaves.Your anger lacks a color. Your anger is the tear streaks on your cheeks, fist with tight knuckles, their Nike sneakers on your face, the phone call you got in early February, the cries of your sister and your mom, and moving to a different neighborhood in the middle of the year. Your anger is the way their hands are of your color, but their hearts are empty. So my purple anger turns into a richer shade, a raisin in your favorite muffin or wine spiraling in a broken glass.Red is the color of our secrets. Our red is not an alert but a promise, the fading ring on my middle finger that you gave me, the rosy tips of pale noses in a snowy winter, the sky on fire right before the sunset, the reason I never invited you to my graduation, and the button on my screen — decline. Our red secrets are what keep your pink happiness safe. My red secret and your red secret are different. My red secret is me ignoring your call in the second week of February, closing my eyes when walking past where you once lived, and writing you letters that I will never send. Your red secret is you calling me every night in the second week of February, never showing me your new school, and never learning anything about my letters. I always imagine what would happen if I picked up your call. I know that I would regret doing it. Our red secret is the foundation of our relationship, your refuge, my lighthouse, and our effort. But it is never our destination.Brown is the color of my ignorance. It is my tote bag, a pair of Converse shoes that I got you for your birthday, the pistil of a short sunflower standing tall on my way home, our large iced lattes with 2% milk, your fingers covered in melting Hershey chocolate bar under the smoldering sun, chocolate all over your lips and everywhere you touched, and your hair, light brown with golden streaks reflecting the white sunlight. My brown ignorance is your teardrops engraved in the small bedroom where no one could see. My brown ignorance is your knot-scarred forehead. This brown ignorance is both bliss and a curse. It is my guilt. My brown ignorance is your wish: your yellow dream. I didn’t want you to know. I didn’t want anyone to know. I didn’t want you to know. My brown ignorance, your words: each other’s fragments.Rose is the color of your ignorance. Frankly, you really don’t know anything. And this is why your rose ignorance is the same as your pink happiness.Yellow is the color of your dream. Your yellow dream is the petals of a sunflower, sunlight penetrating human eyes, noon, the word “lunch,” “Just give me a reason” by Pink that you were listening to when I first walked into Room 215, and the blue hue of the sunset. Your yellow dream is a place where they do not exist. Your yellow dream is a product of your red secret and green sorrow. Your yellow dream wants everyone to close their eyes and fall asleep, slipping back into their own dreams: silent desire for escape. Your yellow dream is something more than a secret but less than sorrow. Your yellow dream is not a choice. However, your yellow dream is a lie. In fact, your yellow dream is something that no longer exists. All that is left now is just a deeper shade of green: an emerald glowing the brightest in the darkest night, tear-soaked eyes, blazers in the rainy morning, a snake stuck in its own skin, and dead leaves right before decaying.Gray is the color of my dream. My gray dream is a blank piece of white graph paper with an infinite number of grids, one pigeon left alone crying from the Pigeonhole principle, a ridiculous amount of honey in my tea, Hilbert’s paradox of the Grand Hotel and my infinite guests of emotions, and the uncoiling memories of us. It is the rationale, reason, and the answer I am looking for. My gray dream is a baby powder tapped into the pores of my body, artificially blocking the colors flooding everywhere. My gray dream is Infinite Jest sitting on your desk, pages filled with streaks of pink highlighters and little green notes. My gray dream is my Differential Equations textbook, pages filled with integrals and derivatives, the reflection of human joy in destroying things and putting them back together like lego blocks that once was a synthetic flower but are now a mechanical robot arm. My gray dream exists, but I know that it is unobtainable. Gray dream is a motivation towards something I can never have. Gray dream is the shadow under the leaves, the only thing that the bottom of the leaves can see. Blue is the color of your grief. All I saw for months were blue bubbles: Are you ok? Please call. Please text back. Please. Please. Please. I miss you. And a gray bubble with three empty dots, reading our blue but never writing back.Black is the color of our trust. Black trust is everything we feel: sorrow, happiness, guilt, grief, secrets, dreams, anger. Black trust is a pile of ashes after burning a warm piece of flesh, the screen of silence after the long credits at the end of the movie, the sky during heavy snowfall, silver ripples on the walls of your grandparent’s house in Akron, your tux, the hypocrisy of white nights, and our pre-prom facetime date that was your dinner and my breakfast. My black trust is getting you flowers and mailing them to your house, just to see you not wearing any the day of prom, but seeing them a day later lying next to your bed, wrapped in pink under the sun. Your black trust is the first time you vomited your green sorrow and red secrets that tattered your heart in a small guest room of your grandparent’s house, sitting next to your now-cold instant ramen and my Nintendo, your pale face full of tears. Your black trust is the first time you told me what happened in the place I love. Our black trust is my silence and your revelation. It is what I think of when I get too tired of living, and I am reminded of you with the hope that you would do the same too. Black trust is the fact that the darkest color can give you the warmest embrace.Teal is the color of my frustration. It is my inability to see the world without two pieces of SiO2 lying in front of my eyes, the way that my emails are signed “Best” or “Best Regards” when what I really want to say is “Shut up,” and the correlation of mundane love and enduring life. It is the ocean hiding plastic waste we belch and vomit into the world, the slow increment of frustration and destruction. It is the wings of a moth flying wherever they want even though they are disgusted. It is the way I do not believe in anything — cannot believe in anything — when I want to believe everything. My teal frustration is my lies disguised as the most benign tumor boiling in my blood, gooey and grotty and gross. It is the way I say I hate everything when what I really feel is love. It is my desire and inability to ignite myself and others but rather hope for a transformation and continue to run. It is the irony of you telling me your worst nightmare: you lying dead in front of your parents. It comes from your green tears and blue bubbles. My worst nightmare is dying from a nuclear bomb, an explosion that swallows the world. Why is death our nightmares when we are all dying anyway? Death is, I think, all colors sitting on a white piece of paper, waiting to be mixed with one another, but ending up becoming dry and lifeless. It is a desert of a hundred colors, and rather than sand, there are acrylic paint dunes on one side and valleys made from the strokes of a paintbrush on the other. My death is the cessation of fizzy rain in my head like a sneak peek of a celebration, a secure feeling of not having to do tomorrow, me turning into whatever color others assign me to, and a slight hope that people I love would remember me. What color is your death? I think of the drought on your color palette with your colors never getting watered. How long will this continue? Every day different colors and finally getting tired of them as life goes on. I know We are only eighteen. Do you think our 36, 54, or 72 years of life would paint us with new colors? Or are we just footnotes with each letter in different colors like one of those meaningless letters in children’s books? You might say that reminds me of my brother when he was going through puberty: Why would you ask that? You’re so depressing. Stop thinking about those things! And if you were still here, you would grab my shoulders and shake my body back and forth as if you were trying to get rid of my brain, and I would laugh, hoping that my brain would fly away with my laughter. I wish I could.Holding hands is a marshmallow with pink and purple swirls that become visible when you rip apart white gelatin made out of dead pigs. It is the squishy tide pods with chemicals wrapped in a tumor-causing monomer, cashmere yarns made out of the hair of dead goats, overly sweet and sometimes bitter taste of a cheap synthetic-strawberry candy stuck onto a shiny plastic wrap, and a mint mixed with white and red that turns into a piece of chalk when it touches my tongue. It is the texture of our skin, my trapezoid carpal clicking with yours, creases on our palms with patterns like the stained glasses of a cathedral, and the liberation of sensation. It is delicate yet not too intimate, tense yet endurable. You have a blueish-gray birthmark carved on the inside of your left index finger. And when I hold your hand, my thumb brushes a wave of rough water that sank beneath your hand. That moment, I realize this wave is the pig bones, dead goats, toxic monomers, and a wrinkly plastic wrap of a candy. And your birthmark: a sweet velvet taste, flower-scented chemicals, and a savory mint on my tongue.Gold is my nostalgia. Gold nostalgia is a pretty little rock I stole from the beach, a roll of expired 35mm film in my fridge, inhaling stories and exhaling emotions, and your Latin textbook that I kept in my dorm for two years. Gold nostalgia is my preference for Sing, Unburied, Sing over The Bean Trees, our yesterdays, party size bags of Lays chips sitting in your room because nobody wanted to finish them, and the unsaid rule of every day 10:15PM FaceTime calls. My gold nostalgia is warm like the sun, soft and fluffy like the tongues of cats, and inevitable like death. Gold nostalgia is the way we look at the sunsets of today but think of the sunrise of yesterday. It is the fading of your freckles in my head, the relation between the two words “yet” and “still,” and the way your name makes me want to go back. Gold nostalgia comes from not being able to forget, reset, or end. My gold nostalgia is your gleaming green eyes I see in my gray dreams, yet, still.Your nostalgia is a black hole: Big Bang Theory that can never be proven, the stupidity of Primordial Soup theory, and the tale of Adam and Eve that is even dumber than Primordial Soup. It is my urge to understand what I can never understand, so I make things up and try my best to believe my own stupid stories. It is the way I think nostalgia is the first emotion people realize that they are feeling. It is you dumping everything in your little black swirl, making it bigger, and boom! — finally, an explosion. In your nostalgia, you are your god, controlling the time and experiencing the beauty of creation, destruction, and reversal. Your nostalgia is the beginning, your everyday, and the first emotion of everything. Your nostalgia is the way your tongue clicks, sliding down the ceiling of your mouth, breathing through the gap between your teeth, and your lips crinkle and pucker like you are blowing a light through your lips: you whisper, “I miss you.” And this becomes the first time I have learned what my favorite word feels like — our nostalgia is sonoluminescence.Gold is also the color of our present. It is you taking a gap year to take care of your family, just like your father did before he went to college. It is the fact that you are coming back to Montana, after everything you have been through in a cruel and lovely place. It is the fact that we stopped speaking to each other, but I am still seeing you in my dreams. It is our very last call, right before Theo’s wedding, you telling me to stop talking to you. It is the pleasant and happy and sad and disappointing fact that you don’t need me anymore. It is your number blocked on my phone, not because I do not want you to call me, but because I will not let myself to call you. I bet my number is blocked on your phone as well, and I love thinking about that. I will not be able to hear your voice at all. But I think of you all the time; one day, you need to tell me you think of me too. It is a scene in my dreams: me and you after 20 years, coincidently encountering each other under the golden sky of a random street no one has ever heard of before which now became a special space established by us. But just like the golden skies of Hudson we walked under every night, the skies here in Providence glow gold too. And whenever I feel golden, I think of us, how we once walked under the white street lamps in between green grasses of Hudson, now in different parts of the world, how we no longer need each other to survive, but still think of our four years together, not because they were unpleasant memories, but because they were golden.
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