The importance of colour

in our lives has been under discussion in a blog post by a knitwear designer, Kate Davies. 

Here's the link if you want to read that post <http://kddandco.com/2022/12/09/wilson-green/>

It was  an interesting read for me because colour is seen differently where I live. I also had to live differently with colour during my kittenhood. 

Colour here can be harsh. This is not true of the entire continent but it is true of where I have lived and where I live now. Even in the suburbs of the state's capital colour can be hard and unforgiving. That may not seem quite right to many people because the jacaranda trees are flowering. They do have a wonderful "purpleness"and "blueness"about them for a short while but look at the dusty grey-brown of their trunks and branches, look at the dull green.

The memorial park in which the library is located has a wonderful "silky oak" tree but the browns are the dusty browns and the greens are on the green-yellow side. They are not the soft warm browns or the lively greens of the English landscape. A clear sky on a hot summer day is what I think of as a "hot" blue. There are people who love it, others who find it strangely lacking in something. 

And if I look out at the hills a little distance away the colours in the landscape are warm browns, warm greens, the yellows, the oranges and creams from the old stone quarry. I have tried to find blues there but they do not really exist among the hundreds of "warm" colours.

The colours around us affect the way we dress too. There are times when the chosen fashion colour for the year will jar in this landscape or. alternatively, work here and jar somewhere else. I remember my mother having a soft mid rose-pink skirt. She took it with her to Europe one summer because it was easy to care for - and barely wore it because, she told me, "I felt like a peacock. It was too bright there."

As a kitten my maternal grandmother insisted, "Little girls where pink." As a result I do not have a single pink thing in my wardrobe. It is not a colour I feel comfortable in. Part of that is because of my relationship with her - not a happy one - but part of it is because it is a colour which simply does not suit me. My mother made all of us a succession of bright red pullovers "because it is easier to find you that way". We wore them exploring the bush around our various homes and on the beach.  We still associate red with the garments she made and I knitted more red garments for my niece and nephews for the same reason. Thankfully none of them seemed to mind. Indeed those who have children asked for the same to be made for their children.

We went through a series of school uniforms, green, maroon, grey, navy, brown. Naturally none of them had the depth of fashion colours. 

And, one year, our mother was excited when the man from the Public Buildings Department told her the school house kitchen was due to be repainted. She could choose the colour. Choose? Yes, between "government green" or "government grey". Those of you who did head over to read Kate's blog will know exactly what I mean. We were moving on so our mother phoned the next family moving in and asked the woman what she would like. They both agreed they were tired of the green and went with the grey. The cupboards would be the usual cream. In an act of defiance the incoming head of the school painted the door knobs red. Later he told the Senior Cat that nobody had said anything. No, why should they? We need colour in our lives.

I love colour. I love putting it together. I love playing with it and seeing how it changes when put against another one or more colours. I am often frustrated at the limited range of colours available. I often wonder who does the colour work at the major Downunder yarn supplier. I'd love to get my paws on their work and do something about it. 

And the other day S... invited me around to her home along with some of her other friends and we all dyed skeins of yarn. I was going to do blue and then changed and did a purple. The skein has, as I hoped, come out purple and white. I know it will be just perfect for my friend I...  Like me she loves colour.