Wednesday, March 4, 2009

Green Light, Blue Light

FACT: I'm colour blind.

I have a difficult time distinguishing between green and blue.

Funny thing is, I didn't really know this until I was in my 20s (many years ago, if you're doing the math).

My high school art teacher, Mr. Blaise, would go on and on about my trees. "The trees are beautiful, Mo. Such vision!" Honestly, you'd think I was a savant the way he went on.

Little did I know that all my trees were blue.

I didn't know this until several years after high school; I was skimming through a magazine. I wasn't reading the articles, I was just flipping through the magazine and looking at the pretty pictures (oh look, shiny). There was an article discussing colour blindness. And there was a box with coloured dots with a caption below that said something like "If you can see the 9 then all is well." I'm looking at it and thinking "What 9??"

Then I read the article.

Oh.
Oh my.
Hmph. Well, that certainly explains a lot.

And before you ask, I can see the difference in colours on stoplights. I can distinguish between red, yellow and green. But I have to admit that some green lights do look blue. So, for me, Blue and/or Green means Go.

Trees and grass look green. It's the teals that really mess me up. There's no teal in my world. There's blue and green. No middle ground. It's this or that.

Someone asked me today how I can bead and sew for my business if I'm colour blind. How do I colour coordinate? One of my colleagues piped up "She has a seeing eye husband." Everyone laughed. But to be honest, that's not far off the mark.

The Husband is my saviour when it comes to coordinating things. I'm constantly asking him if this matches or do these go together. Of course, you can only imagine the fun he has with me. He'll point at something that is clearly green and say "Look at the blue such'n'such."
Poo head.

We were at a car dealer one day, looking at the new releases. I was quite taken with a particular model and exclaimed "And it's such a lovely shade of green." The dealer looked at me with an expression that clearly said "Where's your helmet?" The Husband loudly whispers "She's colour blind." The dealer, nodding sagely, gives a knowing "OH!" and carries on with his pitch. The Husband quietly whispers in my ear "It's blue."

Oh.
Crap.

6 comments:

Cat said...

If I had to rely on my husband to color coordinate my life, I'd be in real trouble!

Busy Bee Suz said...

I can't believe you did not find out earlier. Did you ever have an eye exam????
I suppose lots of people have this issue...so glad you have your seeing eye husband to help out. How long did you have to train him?
:) kidding.

Lynn C Mama to 3 said...

I second what Cat said! If I had to use my Mark as an idea of what matches, I'd be in green/blue plaid, stripes and polka dots!!!

Crazy Mo said...

I can rely on The Husband for colour coordination because, deep down inside, I think he's gay. He's very matchy-poo.

Evil Twin's Wife said...

My husband is a graphic designer and knows colors like the back of his hand (he has to choose tones for whatever project he has), so I could rely on him if need be. :-)

Schmendel said...

The things we don't pick up in school! I graduated without ever learning to tell time. TGF digital watches!