by Gary Struthers

Some time ago I was shopping at the local home improvement center (nope, I am not going to name names) for some red paint for a project I was working on. Being very inspired by the modernist art movement, I was looking for primary red. Standing in front of a wall of color samples, I must have looked something like a deer caught in headlights. The sheer amount of color samples is simply overwhelming, and to some extent amazing. Anyway, looking bewildered in a home improvement store is one way to get a sales associate to help you, and sure enough I was approached by someone who was indeed trying to be helpful when they asked if they could help me find anything. I said yes, I would like red paint, to which the (trying to be) helpful associate responded “what color red?”  I found this question to be a bit odd, you see I always assumed that red was a color, so I responded that I simply wanted red, period. Again I was asked “yes, but what color red?” I am pretty sure at this point I went into some diatribe about red as a primary color, nothing more, and nothing less. The long and short of it is that at the home improvement center there is no such paint with the label “red”. In our efforts to give ourselves more choices, better selections, more options to keep up with our busy lives we have overcomplicated our world to the extent that red no longer exists. Simple is not always a bad thing…..