Greening

We all know that a Green picture is very disagreeable
-advice on watercolor in The American Girl’s Handy Book by Lina and Adelia Beard, 1887

When I was five my father helped me bake a yellow cake from a box for my mother’s birthday. He convinced me it would be fun to dye both the cake and frosting green and serve Mother a nice big slice with her morning coffee in bed as a surprise birthday treat. I remember my mom gamely playing along and praising our efforts though I instinctively knew we’d done something wrong. Some things should not be green: birthday cake, bodily fluids, fuzz on food, your teeth. But then, recording artist Billy Eilish looks great in chartreuse tresses, green is Mother Nature’s favorite color and we all know the planet is starved for more green. So I say, embrace those hues that are yellow and blue.