I think that I decided a long time ago that I didn’t like the color pink. Probably because it was pushed on me. Boys are blue and girls are pink. A girl’s world is pink-washed. I didn’t like that. I didn’t like the feeling of being so easily figured out and dismissed- put in a pretty pink box with a pretty pink bow, predetermined and understood. I wanted the freedom to explore all of life’s colors and all of my many selves. Everything for girls was pink. Why did boys get blue- the color of the sky and sea... or red and orange, the palette of fire and sunsets?
Pink? What’s that, a flower?
I decided I hated pink when I was little. But now, I realize I didn’t give pink her fair chance. I was so determined to resist her soft petals and delicate beauty, in order to resist the monochromatic, rigid and straight path I felt the world gave me, that I missed out on all of her wonder.
So today, I apologize to pink in all of her hues. I welcome her in all of her faces and facets—from her fierce hotness to her blushing tenderness- and every shade in between... We shouldn’t have to choose between strength and surrender, mind and heart, blue and pink. We shouldn’t see fierceness in opposition to femininity.
Be fiercely feminine! Be strong, be soft, be wild, be romantic, be creative, be silly, be crazy, be powerful, be it all. There is beauty in every color and every shade. A woman is not just pink, and pink is not just one shade. The magic of life lies within the countless colors and all of our individual palettes and paint brushes... But today I honor pink, because I dismissed her early on as being too “girly,” as if that were a bad thing, as if that were weak and lesser.
How sad that I somehow felt that coursing through society even as a young girl. But thanks to so many badass and beautiful women in my life, throughout my life, my beliefs changed.
You all are magic!
Never shrink yourself to make anyone else feel more comfortable. Never dull your sparkle & never change your colors.
“Where there is a woman, there is magic.” -Ntozake Shange
This goes out to every woman in my life- past and present!
