pray for purple

Robert Frost said, "The best way out is always through."
* * *
One year for our birthdays, my sister and I got matching bikes. I remember choosing them together. I saw the purple bike with the banana seat and began to plead with my little kindergarten heart that my sister (the biggest tom boy in the neighborhood) would love the pink one. I prayed for the color purple. A birthday gift from the color gods, my purple prayer was answered, a purple predicament solved. My childhood bike rides were on a purple banana seat bike, my tough-as-nails sister by my side on her identical pink one.
* * *
Today I hate the color purple*. I hated it more and more as the minutes went by. I have a client who won't budge. It's purple and only purple. There's no way around this giant purple people eater of a room and so I'm left with only one choice: wade knee deep in thick, messy, purple. California Raisin. Grape Soda. Plum. Dimetapp. (Except Dimetapp makes things better. I don't see how this can get better.) Mulberry. No matter what you call it, a purple by any other name remains, well, purple.

In a dark and dreary mood, I thumbed through racks and racks of fabric samples today. At the end of the purple brick road, there definitely wasn't an Emerald City. Oh, how nice it would be to ignore my client. To pay no attention to that proverbial man behind the (purple) curtain. When I reached the end of the all the purple, there was empty space. I wish I could say that my purple plight has come to an end, but all I have are sample bags full of purple gook. A goulash. Like ink from a leaky pen, my hands are stained purple.

Please, oh please pray for purple.

*Not the movie, just to clarify.