So, pink has been giving me some trouble (nothing to read into there!). I thought about writing some sort of tribute for the ladies, but no inspiring thoughts came forth from that particular spout, or at least none that felt original. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve always been a fan, and I’ve always been perplexed by men who somehow believe the ladies aren’t every bit as capable, strong, intelligent, courageous, imaginative, reliable…. It just seems utterly foolish to believe otherwise and how do you argue with the utterly foolish?

So I went fishing …

Diane’s pink shower cap and her little leather change purse. The pink plaid robe that I gave her for our first Christmas together in Wisconsin that she still has hanging on the back of our bathroom door. It’s feels like a kind of emblem of our marriage.

The color of Pepto-Bismol (how’s that for a segue?). What a perfect name for a medicine designed to treat an upset stomach. “What’s wrong? Don’t know. Must have been something I ate. I’m feeling all Pepto-Bismolly.” I wonder what the other choices were? Hurl-be-gone? Oh-god? Never again?

Pink shrimp and pink flamingos. Where do they get that bright pink plumage? You are what you eat, I guess. Good thing that doesn’t work with guacamole. Imagine having to stick your head underwater to eat. That would certainly cut down on the snacking. “No, really, I’m good. I couldn’t eat another bite.” No wonder they’re so skinny. I just read that freeze-dried shrimp were one of the favorites of the astronauts. Apparently, when you add water those pinkos plump right up.

In the pink. Where does that come from? Does it refer to babies who start out blue and then pink up after taking their first breaths? That sounds right, but I’m not looking it up. Do doctors still give newborns a little slap on the fanny? Did they ever outside of movies and television? What a rude welcome to the world! “Just to let you know, the world’s going to kick you in the….”

Why pink for girls and blue for boys? In 1918 the Ladies’ Home Journal said pink should be for boys and blue for girls because pink was the stronger color. The Ladies’ Home Journal. Ladies! There’s that word again. I like that word. It feels playful and respectful at the same time. Ladies feels friendly, endearing and maybe slightly flirtatious, and yet it’s also part of “Ladies and Gentlemen,” and the respectful formality of occasions with dress-up clothes and people wearing hats. And I’m not talking baseball hats. I’m talking real hat hats … with bands and brims, the kind you could frisbee onto a tall hat rack in the corner. The Ladies’ Home Journal standard stuck until the 1940s when some French fashionadas decided that pink should be for les femmes. “Let them wear pink!”

Pink tongues and lipstick. Pinkies and pinky toes. Mauve, the 70s pink of interior decorators, the brown of pink. Pink’s drab cousin who bores everyone to death at parties. “Have you seen this knew Tupperware?” The opposite of cool, hot, fun Cyndi Lauper Pink, the one who lights up the room and is always out in front of the latest crazes.

Pink ribbons to support the ladies, pink wristbands, pink Nikes, pink hats. Is that meaningful? To wear some pink accessory to say I’m with them? I suppose it is. But is it enough? Not by a long shot.

Pinkos? Why are communists pink? True communists were red. Pinkos were just leaning in that direction, I guess. Communists in training. Inclined toward those menacing Russkis. “Better dead than red.” Really? That’s what you’re going with? Who talks like that?

The pink slip. There’s another one I don’t understand. Why a pink slip? Is it a filing thing? My mother told me her father had worked for a men’s club in downtown Philadelphia for twenty-some years, and then one day, he got a pink slip in with his paycheck. “Your services are no longer required.” That’s capitalism. Makes you want to take another look at those Pinkos, doesn’t it?

Pink peeps. Pink icing. Pink cotton candy and caramel corn. Ugh! Talk about wanting to be dead. Pass the Pepto!

Pretty in Pink. I hated that movie. Reminds me of high school, riotous pink acne, and awkward, self-conscious social skills. Purgatory, basically. Pink purgatory.

Pink Cadillac. Good song. “Well, my love is bigger than a Honda. Yeah, it’s bigger than a Subaru….” My son and his friend Joey chose that for their karaoke song during a summer session at the Rec Center. Both were pre-pubescent. What did they know about cars?