Barbie Loflin

I do not know what my mother was thinking.

I was 8 years old, my little sister, 7, the first time she let us pick the color our room would be painted.   Now, you have to understand, I was a middle child who usually let everyone else make the decisions for her.  I did not rock boats and I did not tolerate well those who had a propensity to do so.  I had a tendency to live (publicly) in neutral shades, blending, trying to be invisible for the most part.  But something happened when my mom said the magic words, “Barbie, what color would you and Angie like your room to be?”  Someone wanted my opinion and in that moment some special kind of Yes! magic welled up inside and before I could stop my lips from moving, or my hand could reach my mouth to silence the shouted vision of my heart, I heard the excited words spring forth, sounding very much like the silent, secret me… “RED!”

I was shocked.  Who said that? I thought to myself.

My mom’s eyebrows rose to hide themselves within her hairline.  And before she could speak to retract the offer of our choosing, I heard the sweet response of my beautiful baby sister, the light of our household, a whispering of… “Ooooh… red!”

And the decision was made.

Red it would be.

“Okay,” my mom continued, “What about the bedspreads?”  I looked at the knobby, white chenille bedspreads that draped our twin beds, ran my hand across their knap and thought aloud (since my ideas were obviously what they now longed for…) “Well, (I hesitated as I thought about calling her by her first name since things were so much more casual now that we were partners, but decided I wanted to keep my teeth and settled on the traditional…) Mom,  if you would just think about it, practically everyone knows that the best color to go with red is black.”  I could have sworn I saw something in my mother’s eyes that silently said Kid, you do not have a lick of sense…but what came out of her mouth was, “Okay.  Red and black it is.”

The next day we set out to complete the transformation, and by bedtime that night, I was officially sleeping in my eight year old mind’s equivalent of… hell.  Do you have any idea what a black bedspread looks like when hazy moonlight reflects off of fiery red walls?

My mom thought I was sleeping peacefully when in fact I had hyperventilated until I passed out.  I awakened the next morning, opened my eyes and immediately began repenting for every sin I could think of, including but not limited to, cutting the hair on all of my sisters Barbie dolls (Sorry, Angie.  Our dog, EJ, did not chew their hair off as I slept).  I kept waiting for Satan to come around the corner.

I have never gotten out of bed and dressed so fast.  I was in the kitchen washing dishes, asking for more chores, helping old people cross streets…  Anything that would keep me from having to go back to that room.

You know, looking back, I know my mother would have changed the room if she had known what I was going through.  All I needed to do was tell her I that I was wrong… red and black did not go together as well as I had thought.  But I had this little issue with admitting I was wrong.  I mean, I had been so proud of the fact that they had asked my opinion and wanted my help, that I just could not go back and say Mom, I was stupid… I hate this room… Please help me.  So I suffered in shell-shocked silence.  (Selah)

But in the end, I decided I hated hell, liked sleep, and didn’t want to get up before sunrise anymore to avoid the walls, so my pride was going to have to bow.  (Anyone else hear the angels singing?)

I went out into the sunshine one day while my mom was hanging clothes on the line.  I just stood there.  I didn’t know what to say to her… so I just stood.  She stopped what she was doing and said, “What’s wrong, baby?”  At the sound of her voice I began to cry (Isn’t it funny how a mom’s voice can do that to you?).  She came to me, and it all tumbled out in a rush… “Mama, I was wrong.  I was really, really, wrong,” I hiccuped as I used my sleeve for a Kleenex.  “What, honey?  What were you wrong about?”  “I hate my room.  It is scary”, I shuddered for effect. “ It makes me have nightmares and I do not want to live in there anymore.”  She put her arms around me and laughed the sweet kind of laugh, “Oh, Sweetheart, why didn’t you tell me sooner?  We can fix that room.  It’s gonna be okay. “  She hugged me and sent me in the house to wash my face – and change my shirt.

She bought sunshine yellow paint.

It took about five coats to deliver me from purgatory, and a gallon of bleach to get enough of the black out of the bedspread to be able to add a baby blue.   In the end, what had been a hellish nightmare became a daytime sky, yellow, blue and white.

It is amazing.

All of that torment,

The sleepless nights,

The fear,

The anxiety…

And all it had taken to free me –

Was admitting …