Have you ever noticed how many songs have the word “blue” in their titles? Moody Blue, Blue Eyes Crying in the Rain, Don’t It Make My Brown Eyes Blue?, Blue Moon of Kentucky, Blue Velvet, and Blue Suede Shoes just to name a few. Very often we use the word “blue” to denote sadness or depression not only in songs but also to describe our emotions. Color historians tell us that blue was related to rain, or storms, and in Greek Mythology, the god Zeus would make rain when he was sad. However, surveys in the US and Europe show that blue is the color most commonly associated with harmony, faithfulness, confidence, infinity, and imagination. In US and European opinion polls, blue is the most popular color, chosen by almost half of both men and women as their favorite color. And blue is currently one of the hottest color trends in home décor.
I personally like every shade of blue known to man, but it wasn’t always that way. As a child, my mother sewed all my clothes, and she seemed to always make clothing for me that had blue in it…so much blue, in fact, that by the time I graduated from high school I had “blue burn-out”. When I first started purchasing my own clothes as a young woman, I would NEVER buy anything blue. Clothes in any color but blue were my choices! It has only been in the past few years or so, that I have been able to tolerate wearing blue, and I can now wear it with no qualms. It is still not a favorite in home décor for me—I lean more toward the greens on that subject. But former First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy used a lot of blues in the White House and their private residences. She considered blue a neutral color; she said all a person had to do was look at nature—the blue sky coordinated beautifully with everything: green grass, flowers of every color, the ocean, and clouds. And she did have a valid point. As we approach the Fall Season, I can think of nothing more breathtaking than the greens, reds, oranges, golds and browns of tree leaves set against a bright blue sky.
Some of my favorite blue things:
- A baby’s blue eyes
- Caribbean waters
- Blue Topaz gems
- The Hope Diamond
- Ceylon (now called Sri Lanka) Sapphires—their amazing color is like no other. By the way, Madagascar is the leading producer of the world’s sapphires.
- A bright blue October sky
- Cookie Monster (yep, I do love cookies!!)
Sources: www.wikipedia.org and www.google.com
(c) 2018 Leslie O. Kelley