Smells like Golden Gate & Brown Enigma

Last year I decided that my life needed more color. Knowing that I was past the appropriate age to dye my hair purple, I embarked instead on the grand adventure of painting my walls.

The first walls I planned to renew were in my bedroom. For weeks I mulled over the endless color options. I even became a regular fixture at the paint stores. Soon I knew all the employees by name and had created family trees for them with the ever present paint samples.


"Hey Johnny, you get a haircut?"
"Wanda, when did you say your niece and her husband would be back from Detroit?"

As hours of indecision turned into weeks of lost time, it became obvious that I needed to stop paying attention to the names of the paint. Names were far too distracting. Every name produced a story in my head. If I didn't like the name, it was hard to even consider using the paint color.

Then a few days after Johnny got his new cut, I found it. The one true color my bedroom was born to wear. But there was a huge problem with the name. It was beyond disgusting; Brown Teepee. I realize this name is supposed to bring images of American Indians on the prairie, hunting the majestic Buffalo. But that's not what I visualized. Since I work in a surgery center where colonoscopies are a daily occurrence, I hear the words TP and brown fairly often. And I can say with assurance that I never want to hear them in any way related to my walls. I tried to forget about the color and choose another, but it was pointless. Behr's Brown Teepee was the color for me. It seemed that this would be a wonderful time to put my denial skills to work. As my youngest daughter would say, I decided to "imaginate" that the paint name was Enigma. This name made me think of spies solving complex puzzles on park benches at night while wearing trench coats. I believe the Sherwin Williams guys and I are the only ones who know Enigma is really a matronly shade of lilac. This name change plan worked well for casual gatherings and chats at the water cooler.

"What did you do this weekend?"
"Oh, I painted my bedroom."
"It's called Enigma."

Then I would show off a color swatch in the form of paint splatters on my shoes. If the color didn't cause people to gasp in appreciation, then the name always did.

It's been a few years since I pilfered paint names. And I'd like to think I've matured as a person and now only judge a paint by it's color. I really want to believe that when I chose Golden Gate as the hue for my entry way and family room that my decision was based solely on beauty and appropriateness. It had nothing to do with the vision I have of fog rolling under the GG Bridge as the sun rises over San Fransisco. Yet this evening as I enjoy my newly painted walls, I can faintly hear the sound of a trolley car and smell the unmistakable wafting scent of Rice-a-Roni.