The Happy Purple Index

by Kim, October 15, 2009 at 6:00am

After yesterday's post about chickens I happened upon a Huffington Post article about cows. It seems that the well-cared-for cow is also more productive:

"By placing more importance on the individual, such as calling a cow by her name or interacting with the animal more as it grows up, we can not only improve the animal’s welfare and her perception of humans, but also increase milk production,” says Dr. Catherine Douglas of Newcastle University.

This bucolic example sums up the quality of life argument put forward by the Take Back Your Time movement: something as unquantifiable as a satisfied, well-rested workforce can make a more productive society. New Dream has always been a proponent of the unquantifiable-yet-essential.  That's why we applaud the efforts of those behind the Happy Planet Index and others who are working towards more human(e) economic indicators.  The Happy Planet Index may be more systematic, but my own personal measure of the quality of life of a given area has to do with the number of purple houses--a sort of Happy Purple Index.

Takoma Park, Maryland, where the New Dream offices are located, boasts an unusually large number of purple houses. They range from deep purple to lavender to mauve, some of them top to toe purple and others just the trim. Why do so many people opt for purple? Maybe just because they can. In most parts of the country, purple is relatively rare, either because it is out of favor as a house paint or because it's actually banned. Most famously, the novelist Sandra Cisneros painted her house in the historic district of San Antonio purple, and the resulting battle was not only one of zoning laws but one of cultures:

"Color is a language. In essence, I am being asked to translate this language....Color is a story. It tells the history of a people. We don't have beautiful showcase houses that tell the story of the class of people I come from. But our inheritance is our sense of color. It has withstood conquests, plagues, genocide, hatred, defeat. Our colors have survived. That's why  you all love fiestas so much, because we know how to have a good time. We know how to laugh. We know a color like bougainvillea pink is important because it will lift your spirits and make your heart pirouette." 

-- Sandra Cisneros, My Purple House

Purple is a kind of my litmus test for neighborhoods: it would be sad to live in a place where a whole color has been lopped off the spectrum. Purple is like that: it's divisive, an unapologetic color. You either covet it--as people did throughout much of history when the purple dyes made from shellfish were costly--or you petition your neighborhood association to ban it from the exterior of houses. There seems to be no in between stance. In Alice Walker's novel The Color Purple, the main character's evolution as a person is mirrored by her changing attitude towards the hue. A popular poem When I Am An Old Woman I Shall Wear Purple uses the color as a symbol of embracing oneself after ceasing to care what other people think.

All that fuss over a color just goes to show that little things matter, and it's okay to let the little things matter as long as you choose those things wisely.  Quality of life is often like a purple house: it's about asserting little freedoms that end up uplifting yourself and others. Like the connection established by a farmer who talks to her cows, it doesn't have to cost much and it may even look a little silly, but making quality of life a priority eventually pays off. In my case, I nod at the purple houses on my street which fortify me on the way to work in every morning. "Thanks," is what the nod communicates to the houses, "for proclaiming a little healthy abandon. Thanks for taking a stand just because you can. Thanks for making my heart pirouette."