The colour of the moment

By Arezou

“Thank you for your interest in completing the application. We regret to inform you that after careful …”, the email preview popped on my phone while I was attending our virtual daily standup. I didn’t bother to open it, but at that moment, a flood of negative thoughts rushed into my mind. “How do you feel about kicking off the new project?” Zoe, my colleague said to me. “Emm, … well … I mean, emm”, my mind was a complete blank. Zoe jumped in again : “I say you feel Moonstone Blue! No one probably knows, but I have an underrated superpower! I experience our ordinary World in an unordinary way with my own color palette. Remind me to explain Synaesthesia later, that’s what it is called. Sorry, I have to jump off the call for another meeting”. My dad has always been color-blinded, but I never imagined the other way around, where someone could mingle the World with colors. I gazed into my surroundings that I set up for my home office, the space-gray Macbook, the RGB keyboard, the walnut desk, the bubble cube candle, sitting next to my plant-mates Pothos and Aloe. Despite all the colors here and there, everything feels grayscale. Maybe it’s the torrent of bad news over the last two years, the global pandemic, family breakdown, war, recession, heat waves, and so on. I pondered what color is pure joy after all. I’m not synaesthesis, but can I consciously mask my grief with a good splash of colors? The next day I woke up and decided to conduct my color-consciousness experiment, as I walked on Chapel Street. I have lived in South Yarra for five years, Melbourne's most-loved suburb, but since the lockdown, every corner has turned into a monotonous colourscape for me, less enticing. Deep breaths in, deep breaths out: “Alright Chapel Street! Let’s do this.” My first stop is ‘Melbourne High School’. From the entrance, I can see a group of young boys playing soccer on the grass. Judging by the noise exposure, it seems like a match is going on. In all the excitement, I am trying to hear the colors. Cheerful greens start buzzing around, maybe forest green and spring green, or even mint, and lime greens for a diehard fan. “What did Pink Floyd mean by singing Green is the colour of her kind?” I am just thinking in my head. Anyway, I need to move on. A few steps down, the ‘Como Centre’ from the other side of the street draws my attention. The building looks confident in its dignified allure, throwing some purples with orchids and lavenders. It is a shame not to see it from a close distance, so I cross the street and embrace those purple pigments. Approaching the Toorak Road intersection, I suddenly stop in front of the ‘Imperial’ bar. The memories come flooding back. Friend’s gatherings, happy hours, coconut margarita, and dance nights. It feels like images of dried flowers pressed between pages of an old book. The vibe is pastel red and crimson glory. I remember the day we went for a drink at Imperial and watched the Avengers Endgame at the ‘Jam Factory’ afterward. When was the last time I used ‘we’, as in the first person plural pronoun? It must have been a long time. In that case, the historic Jam Factory is my next stop, but wait! It is shut down for redevelopment. In a matter of seconds, the happy red colors decay. My eyes are witnessing some sort of rusty brown and dusty yellow. A wave of nostalgia sweeps over me. I take a detour at Little Chapel Street to visit ‘Chapel Off Chapel’, the iconic performing arts venue. Rhonda Burchmore, Mandolin Orchestra's concert, the piano bar, and a litany of impressive artworks. There is no solo color sensation here, but rather multi-hued palettes unique to each artist. Okay, let's go back to the main street and head to the Windsor part of Chapel. ‘Epilepsy Foundation OpShop’ is my go-to place to be in good heart. As a child, I had absence seizures where I would lose consciousness, and my eyes would roll back in my head. At that time people dismissed it and I couldn’t articulate it. Now that I’m older, I’m passionate about encouraging more people to understand and support people who live with epilepsy. For me, the OpShop rhymes with white gravitate toward light beige for a bit of faith in making positive changes in the World. Since I have made it this far off Chapel Street, I have to visit the ‘Cookie Box’, a minute apart from the OpShop. As I walk towards the store, the aroma of freshly baked cookies wafts over me. How can I colorize the hot red velvet cookie filled with silky cream cheese frosting? I don’t know the answer, but what I do know is that the Cookie Box is the end of my color journey. I stop here, buy a cookie box and indulge myself in all the colors and smells around me that I wasn’t mindful of. The universe is full of color stories. Maybe your life has been upended by the pandemic, maybe you struggle with depression or anxiety or you just lack the motivation to live your day-to-day life. Let’s be obsessed with colors. As you go through the day, be present in the moment and colorize the feeling of that moment. If your life canvas doesn’t have the color you always dream of, as yet, remind yourself White is the blending of all colors. Shake off that disappointment and keep going.

Story Content

We regret to inform you that after careful …”, the email preview popped on my phone while I was attending our virtual daily standup. I didn’t bother to open it, but at that moment, a flood of negative thoughts rushed into my mind. “How do you feel about kicking off the new project?” Zoe, my colleague said to me. “Emm, … well … I mean, emm”, my mind was a complete blank. Zoe jumped in again : “I say you feel Moonstone Blue! No one probably knows, but I have an underrated superpower! I experience our ordinary World in an unordinary way with my own color palette. Remind me to explain Synaesthesia later, that’s what it is called. Sorry, I have to jump off the call for another meeting”. My dad has always been color-blinded, but I never imagined the other way around, where someone could mingle the World with colors. I gazed into my surroundings that I set up for my home office, the space-gray Macbook, the RGB keyboard, the walnut desk, the bubble cube candle, sitting next to my plant-mates Pothos and Aloe. Despite all the colors here and there, everything feels grayscale. Maybe it’s the torrent of bad news over the last two years, the global pandemic, family breakdown, war, recession, heat waves, and so on. I pondered what color is pure joy after all. I’m not synaesthesis, but can I consciously mask my grief with a good splash of colors? The next day I woke up and decided to conduct my color-consciousness experiment, as I walked on Chapel Street. I have lived in South Yarra for five years, Melbourne's most-loved suburb, but since the lockdown, every corner has turned into a monotonous colourscape for me, less enticing. Deep breaths in, deep breaths out: “Alright Chapel Street! Let’s do this.” My first stop is ‘Melbourne High School’. From the entrance, I can see a group of young boys playing soccer on the grass. Judging by the noise exposure, it seems like a match is going on. In all the excitement, I am trying to hear the colors. Cheerful greens start buzzing around, maybe forest green and spring green, or even mint, and lime greens for a diehard fan. “What did Pink Floyd mean by singing Green is the colour of her kind?” I am just thinking in my head. Anyway, I need to move on. A few steps down, the ‘Como Centre’ from the other side of the street draws my attention. The building looks confident in its dignified allure, throwing some purples with orchids and lavenders. It is a shame not to see it from a close distance, so I cross the street and embrace those purple pigments. Approaching the Toorak Road intersection, I suddenly stop in front of the ‘Imperial’ bar. The memories come flooding back. Friend’s gatherings, happy hours, coconut margarita, and dance nights. It feels like images of dried flowers pressed between pages of an old book. The vibe is pastel red and crimson glory. I remember the day we went for a drink at Imperial and watched the Avengers Endgame at the ‘Jam Factory’ afterward. When was the last time I used ‘we’, as in the first person plural pronoun? It must have been a long time. In that case, the historic Jam Factory is my next stop, but wait! It is shut down for redevelopment. In a matter of seconds, the happy red colors decay. My eyes are witnessing some sort of rusty brown and dusty yellow. A wave of nostalgia sweeps over me. I take a detour at Little Chapel Street to visit ‘Chapel Off Chapel’, the iconic performing arts venue. Rhonda Burchmore, Mandolin Orchestra's concert, the piano bar, and a litany of impressive artworks. There is no solo color sensation here, but rather multi-hued palettes unique to each artist. Okay, let's go back to the main street and head to the Windsor part of Chapel. ‘Epilepsy Foundation OpShop’ is my go-to place to be in good heart. As a child, I had absence seizures where I would lose consciousness, and my eyes would roll back in my head. At that time people dismissed it and I couldn’t articulate it. Now that I’m older, I’m passionate about encouraging more people to understand and support people who live with epilepsy. For me, the OpShop rhymes with white gravitate toward light beige for a bit of faith in making positive changes in the World. Since I have made it this far off Chapel Street, I have to visit the ‘Cookie Box’, a minute apart from the OpShop. As I walk towards the store, the aroma of freshly baked cookies wafts over me. How can I colorize the hot red velvet cookie filled with silky cream cheese frosting? I don’t know the answer, but what I do know is that the Cookie Box is the end of my color journey. I stop here, buy a cookie box and indulge myself in all the colors and smells around me that I wasn’t mindful of. The universe is full of color stories. Maybe your life has been upended by the pandemic, maybe you struggle with depression or anxiety or you just lack the motivation to live your day-to-day life. Let’s be obsessed with colors. As you go through the day, be present in the moment and colorize the feeling of that moment. If your life canvas doesn’t have the color you always dream of, as yet, remind yourself White is the blending of all colors. Shake off that disappointment and keep going.

The colour of the moment

The colour of the moment

Arezou

“How do you feel about kicking off the new project?” Zoe, my colleague said to me.

“Emm, … well … I mean, emm”, my mind was a complete blank. Zoe jumped in again : “I say you feel Moonstone Blue! No one probably knows, but I have an underrated superpower! I experience our ordinary World in an unordinary way with my own color palette. Remind me to explain Synaesthesia later, that’s what it is called. Sorry, I have to jump off the call for another meeting”.

My dad has always been color-blinded, but I never imagined the other way around, where someone could mingle the World with colors.

I gazed into my surroundings that I set up for my home office, the space-gray Macbook, the RGB keyboard, the walnut desk, the bubble cube candle, sitting next to my plant-mates Pothos and Aloe. Despite all the colors here and there, everything feels grayscale. Maybe it’s the torrent of bad news over the last two years, the global pandemic, family breakdown, war, recession, heat waves, and so on. I pondered what color is pure joy after all. I’m not synaesthesis, but can I consciously mask my grief with a good splash of colors?

The next day I woke up and decided to conduct my color-consciousness experiment, as I walked on Chapel Street. I have lived in South Yarra for five years, Melbourne's most-loved suburb, but since the lockdown, every corner has turned into a monotonous colourscape for me, less enticing. Deep breaths in, deep breaths out: “Alright Chapel Street!

Let’s do this.” My first stop is ‘Melbourne High School’. From the entrance, I can see a group of young boys playing soccer on the grass. Judging by the noise exposure, it seems like a match is going on. In all the excitement, I am trying to hear the colors. Cheerful greens start buzzing around, maybe forest green and spring green, or even mint, and lime greens for a diehard fan. “What did Pink Floyd mean by singing Green is the colour of her kind?” I am just thinking in my head. Anyway, I need to move on.

A few steps down, the ‘Como Centre’ from the other side of the street draws my attention. The building looks confident in its dignified allure, throwing some purples with orchids and lavenders. It is a shame not to see it from a close distance, so I cross the street and embrace those purple pigments.

Approaching the Toorak Road intersection, I suddenly stop in front of the ‘Imperial’ bar. The memories come flooding back. Friend’s gatherings, happy hours, coconut margarita, and dance nights. It feels like images of dried flowers pressed between pages of an old book. The vibe is pastel red and crimson glory.

I remember the day we went for a drink at Imperial and watched the Avengers Endgame at the ‘Jam Factory’ afterward. When was the last time I used ‘we’, as in the first person plural pronoun? It must have been a long time. In that case, the historic Jam Factory is my next stop, but wait! It is shut down for redevelopment. In a matter of seconds, the happy red colors decay. My eyes are witnessing some sort of rusty brown and dusty yellow.

A wave of nostalgia sweeps over me. I take a detour at Little Chapel Street to visit ‘Chapel Off Chapel’, the iconic performing arts venue. Rhonda Burchmore, Mandolin Orchestra's concert, the piano bar, and a litany of impressive artworks. There is no solo color sensation here, but rather multi-hued palettes unique to each artist.

Okay, let's go back to the main street and head to the Windsor part of Chapel. ‘Epilepsy Foundation OpShop’ is my go-to place to be in good heart. As a child, I had absence seizures where I would lose consciousness, and my eyes would roll back in my head. At that time people dismissed it and I couldn’t articulate it. Now that I’m older, I’m passionate about encouraging more people to understand and support people who live with epilepsy. For me, the OpShop rhymes with white gravitate toward light beige for a bit of faith in making positive changes in the World.

Since I have made it this far off Chapel Street, I have to visit the ‘Cookie Box’, a minute apart from the OpShop. As I walk towards the store, the aroma of freshly baked cookies wafts over me. How can I colorize the hot red velvet cookie filled with silky cream cheese frosting? I don’t know the answer, but what I do know is that the Cookie Box is the end of my color journey. I stop here, buy a cookie box and indulge myself in all the colors and smells around me that I wasn’t mindful of.

The universe is full of color stories.

Maybe your life has been upended by the pandemic, maybe you struggle with depression or anxiety or you just lack the motivation to live your day-to-day life. Let’s be obsessed with colors. As you go through the day, be present in the moment and colorize the feeling of that moment. If your life canvas doesn’t have the color you always dream of, as yet, remind yourself White is the blending of all colors. Shake off that disappointment and keep going.