It’s not that I’m color blind; I am simply indifferent to color. Red, blue and yellow are all the same for me.
This, on many occasions, has challenged the Graceful Mistress of the Parish House, who is very meticulous when describing anything or person.
When remodeling my office in the parsonage, my wife asked, “What color would you like the walls to be painted?”
Sounds like a good question, but it’s no question if you know me.
“I don’t care about color. What you think is best for me is fine.”
Thinking that he had solved the problem, I felt comfortable, but his answer made me realize that the problem had not been solved.
“It’s your office,” he said, “what color would you like the walls to be painted?” With that, he looked at me with a very sociable smile, which infects me.
Knowing that he would not stop until he received an answer from me, I said, “Paint the walls purple.”
As for me, it didn’t matter what color the walls were. I wasn’t going to be studying the walls when I was in my study.
Looking at me for a moment, he finally said, “Okay, I’ll paint it white.”
I begin to learn to solve problems in our house.
Color doesn’t mean much to me. When I get dressed on Sunday morning, my wife is very concerned that my tie will match my suit, and my suit will match my shoes color-wise.
For me, the only thing that counts is, does it fit?
It finally fell on me the other day. We were doing our last shopping for Christmas, and I still had a couple of gifts to buy, and she had a shopping cart full of gifts to buy.
We were about to finish when I remembered a gift I wanted to receive and had completely forgotten about it. So I asked my wife, who was the chauffeur at the time, if she could stop by a store so I could come in and get my last Christmas present. He was almost exhausted, but this was the end.
He parked in the parking lot and when I got out I said, “I won’t be long.”
I didn’t pay attention to the parking lot when I left the car and went into the store. I have no reason to review it and evaluate every vehicle in that parking lot. All I had in mind was to go in, buy my gift, get out, get back in the car, and go home.
I know my wife’s car is red. That’s all I can get with that. So when I came out of the shopping store, I was looking for a red car.
It seemed like an easy thing to do, but as I looked up and down the parking lot, there must have been thousands of red cars. Not quite, but it seemed that way. From my perspective, they all looked alike. I didn’t remember what kind of car my wife had, only that it was red. The fact that he remembered it was red was something.
I went to the first red car, no one was there and the doors were closed, so I went to several others. I couldn’t find the kind lady of the parsonage. I was almost tempted to phone a missing person alert; maybe the police could find her better than me.
I had my cell phone with me and I thought I’d call her to find out where she was. But if I did, I would have to live with it for the rest of my life. You know how that is!
I decided to continue my search, I looked at one red car after another and couldn’t find her anywhere. Maybe it took me too long to do the shopping and she got tired of waiting and went home.
I’m thinking of putting a little white flag on top of your car’s antenna so I can at least find it that way. But first he had to find her.
Then I heard a horn, looked down the line and saw a hand outside the window waving at me. So there she was in view.
I was a little exasperated when I got to the car, but then it got a bit worse. He was playing a joke on me. As soon as I entered the store, he moved his car. There was no chance that he would find it under those circumstances.
When I got to the car, she was laughing hysterically and, laughing, said, “I got you.”
I had to admit that she caught me this time. Even if he could have remembered what kind of car it was, it was not where he expected it to be. I don’t think I can survive this one.
As we drove home, she was sitting on the driver’s side smiling while I was sitting on the passenger’s side thinking. A scripture verse came to mind. “The ear that hears and the eye that sees, the Lord made both” (Proverbs 20:12).
What I have learned in my life is that hearing and seeing are crucial elements in any relationship.