Transcriber: Margaret Dalton Reviewer: Anna Sobota
Colors can be hard to learn and tricky to figure out,
especially if they can make an impact on how you see the world
and how the world sees you.
If I were to ask you what color you see based on my shirt,
you’d probably answer, brown.
Now, if I would ask the color you see based on my skin tone,
would you answer based on my race
or would you answer based on the actual color of my skin?
When I was about three years old,
my parents were worried that I was struggling to learn my colors
and they were really trying to help.
But can let you in on a little secret?
Do you know that feeling when you’re learning something,
and your parents are trying to help but they end up making it more stressful,
and then, you end up more confused
before you ask them for the help in the first place?
And if your parents are anything like mine,
they probably get so confused that they might say something like,
“we didn’t learn this that way.”
My parents were seriously trying
to teach me the different names and shades of colors.
But meanwhile, my dad had the cable news on all the time
and I heard the news people talking about folks who tried to conserve energy
and recycle in order to save our environment as being green.
And then, another time, I’d hear adults sighing at each other about
whether red states are more important than blue states.
Yeah, that’s what learning colors was like for me.
We talked about them one way at home,
but then the world was talking about them in a whole ’nother way.
I even got into a bit of a disagreement about identifying colors in preschool.
Now you’re probably wondering what could go wrong in preschool, right?
Well, I remember this story like it was yesterday.
In fact, it was one of my earliest memories.
I remember jumping into the car and crying to my mom,
“You lied to me. You lied to me.”
My mom worried and confused, pulled over to the side of the road.
What do you mean?
How did I lie to you?
You told me that we were black.
We are Black, responded my mom.
But my teacher told me I was brown, I said.
My mom hearing this chuckled and asked,
were you learning about the colors in the crayon box today in class?
Yes, I said.
And my teacher held up a brown crayon saying that I was brown.
My mom chuckled again and explained to me
how two things can be true at the same time.
When talking about the colors in the crayon box, yes, I am brown.
When talking about my race, I’m Black.
And boy, was I relieved.
The next day, my best friend, Charlie, who is white,
well, actually he was confusingly pink;
which didn’t make learning colors any easier;
walked up to me.
I guess he was trying to figure out the coloring box debate, too.
He flipped my hand over then his hand over with both of our palms facing upwards.
He said he was trying to prove that we were both the same color,
but I wasn’t having it.
Charlie, I said,
if you want to talk about the colors in the crayon box,
we can talk about the colors in the crayon box.
But if we’re talking about me, I’m Black all over.
The world is filled with so many colors
with even more names, meanings and memories behind them.
So today I leave you with this one thought:
Every person has their own crayon box.
But it’s up to you how you view the colors.