I stood back from the wall and surveyed the changes I had wrought in the last hour.  My right hand was speckled like a sparrow’s egg and I was still holding the paint roller as I cast a critical eye across the flat plane in front of me, free of blemishes, smooth and perfect, even in the revealing sunlight filling the room . I found myself wishing that I could, in the space of so short a time, renovate myself as fully and with such instant, obvious results.  Nothing makes a room more beautiful more quickly than a fresh coat of paint.

So what would be the equivalent of paint in effecting that kind of personal renovation, I wondered? I polled my friends who were helping me.

“Oh, the perfect haircut,” one said, as she coiffed her ash blonde hair, which I’ve never seen not perfectly cut, perfectly colored and lovely. Maybe she was right…

“I think it’s when you’re able to be completely at peace and not think about anything stressful in your life,” said another.

“It’s none of those things,” said the only male voice in the room.”  It’s fresh, bright new love.  “It colors your heart and soul like nothing else I know. There’s nothing like being in love.”

If there was a better, truer answer, none of us in that room knew what it was. And for a moment we were thoughtful– and there were smiles, nods, and faraway looks. We picked up our brushes and rollers, dipped them in paint, let the color flow from our hearts onto the walls, and remembered.