My
parents were pretty cool. Sure, it took some time for me to realize
it-about 50 years-but once I really thought about how they lived
their lives, I was impressed by just how cool they really were. No,
they didn't set any trends. They didn't even participate much in
trends. Nor were they particularly talented. In fact, they were
pretty ordinary, except for one thing:
Flamingo
Pink shutters. And a front door to match. Not Pale Pink, or Rose
Pink, but bright, shocking Flamingo Pink that you could almost hear
on a bright summer day. It was actually more of a “Shocking Pink”,
but my parent's kept saying it was Flamingo Pink, so who was I to
argue?
While
this may have been normal in parts of Miami or other communities
further south, in Northern Virginia, just outside of Washington D.C.
it was not the norm.
When my
parents bought the house I grew up in, a nice 3 bedroom, brick split
level ranch, the ornamental shutters were painted white. This
wouldn't do, because my mother's favorite color was Flamingo Pink (or
alternately Coral Pink). The house was brand new. The neighborhood
was still undergoing construction, so we didn't even have grass
growing in the yard, just the weird green stuff they sprayed on lawns
back then to make it look better until the grass seed took root. Yet,
the first thing my father did was paint the shutters Flamingo Pink.
As the
neighborhood grew, everyone else kept their shutters white, or some
other innocuous color such as gray, slate blue, maybe a pale yellow.
Occasionally black (which got the kids in the neighborhood telling
stories about the evil things that went on there). People driving by
our house were immediately struck by just how much the shutters stood
out not only from the the 30 foot high brick wall, but from every
other house in the neighborhood.
My
mother didn't care: that was her favorite color. My father loved my
mother enough to do whatever he could to make her happy, even if he
knew there were some comments about other families in the
neighborhood about just how shockingly pink our shutters were. I
remember at times I wished my parents were better at conforming,
shutter-wise, to the standards of the neighborhood. At other times I
felt pride in being different.
It
wasn't until years later, when I was old enough to stop caring if
people snickered at how I dressed or looked, that I realized how
utterly cool those pink shutters, and my parents, were.
You see,
coolness is a matter of sticking to what you want to do, not out of
rebellion or trying to look special, but simply because it makes you
happy. A lot of people think being cool consists of dressing, acting
and speaking in a way that others desire to emulate. That's not
really being cool, it's being pretentious. That's because genuine
coolness requires some originality. Without originality, attempts at
being cool just end up as follow the fad efforts that really only
impress other unoriginal thinkers.
Being
different just to make a statement or rebel from the norm isn't
necessarily cool either. It's often just being childish. That's
because another factor in being truly cool, besides originality, is
self-confidence. Rebellion isn't a sign of self-confidence. In fact,
it's usually a sign of insecurity or resentment. Real self-confidence
is following a preferred path because that path involves contentment,
satisfaction and happiness.
My
parents had the self-confidence that comes from loving each other
enough to be willing to please each other without concern as to what
others thought about it. You don't get much cooler than that.
Shocking
Flamingo Pink shutters in a neighborhood of pastel or earth tone
shutters certainly requires a degree of self-confidence.
That
coolness on the part of my parents extended to how they landscaped
the big slope that made up a large part of the back yard. After
laying in several tons of blue granite walls and concrete walkways to
keep things from sliding away in a heavy rain, we planted a ton,
literally, of creeping phlox in white, blue and, yes, pink. After
they began creeping (as is their purpose) the entire hill would erupt
in a riotous mosaic of white, blue and pink every summer. People
driving by would slow down to look at the sight, it was so glorious.
They would of course see the Flamingo Pink shutters as well.
I like
to think they would drive off muttering “That was so cool”.
