Let's Share Our Color Stories - continued with white

Join us anytime with this creative writing prompt exploring color memories and stories. 'White' is the third post and color.

What are color stories and how to participate

If this is the first post you’ve seen about color stories and you’re wondering what it’s all about, I’m so glad you’re here and would love for you to join in! You can join in anytime, and come back to any of these posts later. You haven’t missed anything and you are not late.

I began exploring color memories and found the process fun, therapeutic, surprising, and an absolute delight, so naturally, I wanted to invite others into the process.

This is a zero-pressure creative writing prompt to explore how color shows up in the depths of our memory banks. You’ll dedicate some time exploring a particular color in your memory. If you feel stuck, you may want to look at old pictures, think about your old favorite toys or games or things around your childhood home, or even the places you spent the most time.

As thoughts come to mind, jot them down stream-of-consciousness style. Once you have this list, determine which ones stand out to you that are holding a story waiting to be told and allow your pen to write or your fingers to type it/them out. That’s it! It doesn’t have to be edited or post-worthy. This is just a fun, playful creative prompt.

Next, I’d love for you to share your story or stories, or even just your stream-of-consciousness list. Feel free to share them here in the comments (or the comments of the particular color post: red here and purple here), or post them on your own social accounts and engage with your followers; the more the merrier!

We began with red, then purple, and now our third color is white. If you want to start with white, wonderful. If you’d like to go back and start from the beginning, feel free. You can do this at your own pace, anytime, even if you happen to stumble upon this post a year from now. I know how much this creative writing prompt blessed me and I want that for you, too. I promise you will be surprised at some point if you follow along. Everyone who has joined in so far has said so.

I’ll add that although this has mostly been a delightful experience for me, anytime we dust off the corners of our memories, triggers may be revealed causing emotional responses we were not expecting. I had one surprising memory reveal itself and it came with me to my next therapy appointment. Ultimately, as I processed it with my therapist, it turned from a discomfort to a blessing.

Renoir said once that nothing was so difficult, and at the same time so exciting, to paint, as white on white.

Ambroise Vollard, French Contemporary artist, 1866-1939

White stream-of-consciousness list

The white flag for capture the flag in our neighborhood, my white Easter bonnets, gloves, dresses, and lacy socks, Mamoo’s pretty white hair, the white fuzzy mist around the door of my childhood bedroom, the porcelain lady statue in Mamoo’s guest bedroom with the white dress, the white gazebo in Aunt Brenda’s back yard, the white gazebo at the McDonald’s fishing pond in Salem, clover crowns, Mom’s white convertible Celica that I took out one night, Dad’s white(ish) Audi with the stick shift when I learned to drive, the cream poured into Mamoo’s coffee that she would let me sip and it was so sweet and yummy and tasted how her breath always smelled, the white marshmallow goo Dad used to make his famous fudge, Mamaw’s dentures in her little pink holder, seeing the black lice on my white pillow during softball season when the whole team got lice from sharing helmets, white processed sweet treats: the white in Oatmeal Cream Pies, the white in Twinkies, the white in Swiss Roll Ups, the white in the little caramel candies that had white in the middle, the white stick candies at Cracker Barrell (I think white was peppermint or vanilla), white shells that I collected with Mamoo, the white marshmallows in my hot cocoa when we went to chop down a Christmas tree, Dad’s white underwear that we ironed funny transfers onto one year (was he mad?), the white shades that had to be installed in my bedroom because I was allergic to dust, Ann’s white coconut cake at Christmas, the white casserole dishes for baked beans and potato salad everyone always had when we would go on church and family picnics, the snow on the roof of our neighbor’s shed where we’d sneak and hang out, the white hill we created while sledding and when I went over it, it knocked the breath out of me (first time that had ever happened), the white giant clump of clay on the potter’s wheel in my high school art class, my white My Little Pony dolls

Purify me with hyssop, and I shall be clean;

Wash me, and I shall be whiter than snow.

Psalm 51:7

The white stories

I. Angels Around Me

It was angels, yes; now I know. They were always there.

From the time I was 4, until I moved out of state for college, the house on Chamberlain Lane was home. We lived in a small town where people left their front doors unlocked. I felt safe in our home, but like many children, still had fears about certain things in and around our house. One of my biggest fears was that, as the first bedroom a burglar would encounter upon walking down our hallway while breaking-and-entering our home, I would be the first victim and the rest of my family, whose rooms were down the hall, would never know anything had ever happened to me. I would pray my prayers alone before bed, “Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep…” and after I did my usual rollcall asking God to bless all of my family and friends, I’d ask for him to keep me safe.

I don’t remember when I first saw the mysterious whiteish glow that lined the inner edge of the door frame around the door to my room, but after I got over the realization that it wasn’t going away, and then my fear about facing it or trying to decide what in the world it was (and zipping past it quickly as I entered or left my room), I decided to embrace this misty, ethereal energy, this presence that buzzed just along my doorframe. I wouldn’t feel anything when I would pass by it. There were only a handful of times I was brave enough to touch it and when I did, I felt nothing. I never even shared this with my parents. I knew they wouldn’t believe me or see it.

This white glow would come and go for years. I learned to embrace it, and would even greet it as I entered or left my bedroom. I decided to believe it was some sort of presence there to protect me. I decided to believe it had something to do with angels, and they were watching over me.

“…may angels watch me through the night, and keep me in their blessed sight…Amen.”

II. Mighty whitey tighties

Great Uncle John was a pretty eccentric old man. A couple times a year, when our family would visit the North Carolina relatives, we’d make a stop by Uncle John and Aunt Jane’s house. He wasn’t much of an adult conversationalist but he sought opportunities to spend a few minutes with me and my brother.

With his head tilted down, I’d meet his eyes, peering above his thick glasses. He’d been waiting for that eye contact. Then, he’d nod in a ‘follow me’ way, and Ryan and I would get up and follow behind him as we all walked outside to his car.

During this short walk, we would see Uncle John begin to come alive. His excitement was palpable and as he’d turn the key to pop open the trunk of his car, you’d think we were standing with a different person, someone akin to the kid in the candy store.

Filled nearly to the brim of the trunk of Uncle John’s car were hundreds of rolls of iron on transfers. They looked like large, thick rolls of stickers, with one single image repeated by the hundreds on a roll of white, parchment-like paper. The images were random and many, very silly. There were cartoon characters, silly anthropomorphic animals, cars, college logos, roller skates, letters of the alphabet, unicorns, band names of the 70’s and 80’s, and other iconic emblems of the times. Uncle John cherished them all.

His gift to us, and how he would try to connect with us, was to invite us to choose a roll, any roll, to take home. We could tell it was his greatest pleasure to share these rolls. This happened every time we’d visit and by the time I was a teen, my brother and I had accumulated quite a collection of iron-on transfer rolls, too. We always thought they were a little silly, but we knew Uncle John loved his rolls and we wanted to honor him by engaging with him in this way. We never used a single image in the hundreds of images we’d collected - until one summer in my teens.

It was a typical laundry day and I was folding whites. I’m not sure why or how the idea came to me but as I was folding Dad’s clothes, I held up a pair of his underwear and decided they would make the perfect canvas for one of Uncle John’s iron on transfers. Dad was at work so I knew I had some time to pull this off. I gathered all of the underwear in his underwear drawer and pulled out the iron and ironing board. I rummaged through our collection of transfers and chose the silliest one I could. I wish I could remember exactly what it was, nobody can when I brought this story up recently, but my memory recalls an image of Mighty Mouse, with his arms out to the side showing off his muscles in his caped outfit. I folded all of them nicely and tucked them in his underwear drawer and waited.

My parents’ bed was a popular gathering place when I was a teen. We’d all pile up and watch TV together. Ryan and I were lying on the bed when Dad reached into his drawer to pull out a pair of clean underwear. He looked puzzled. We tried hard to keep from laughing. He pulled out another pair. His eyebrows furrowed, as he pulled out yet another decorated pair. Ryan and I began laughing. I think Dad was a little annoyed when he realized what had happened, and that no single pair remained unscathed. Eventually, he came to terms with this prank and I believe he may have even appreciated it. After all, Dad was no amateur at pulling off a prank or joke, and family traits do run deep.

---

I tried to find images of rolls of iron on transfers and couldn’t, but I was able to walk back in time and find a few resources selling these vintage treasures.

Do you remember iron-on transfers?

source here

source here

source here

source here

White … is not a mere absence of color; it is a shining and affirmative thing, as fierce as red, as definite as black…. God paints in many colors; but He never paints so gorgeously, I had almost said so gaudily, as when He paints in white.

Gilbert Keith, Chesterton British author, 1874–1936