In Pursuit of Colors and Other Magical Things
My grandmother would tell me stories of how, back when she was
younger, there used to be colors. There were colors everywhere as far
as the eye could see, and the colors themselves had various different
shades and tints. Some colors were indescribable; words would not do
these colors justice. I loved hearing Grandmother talk about the
colors: the riveting reds, the beautiful blues, and the gorgeous greens.
Grandmother talked about this thing called rainbows. Rainbows were
a whole bunch of colors smashed together, and a person could only see
them when it was raining. The one crucial thing was that the sun had
to be out while it rained. People sometimes made artificial rainbows
by using a hose or a sprinkler. I thought rainbows were magical. When
I was little kid, I would go outside, whenever it was raining, and do a
Rainbow dance. I would extend my arms with my palms facing the sky,
squeeze my eyes real tight, and spin around and around until I fell
down. I believed that dance, if I tried hard enough, could make the
rainbow appear by sheer will. I imagined that the rainbow would
appear and then spread everywhere. The rainbow would infect
Meghan O'Toole
8