Color.

Before I transformed myself into librarian extraordinaire, I was an artist. I graduated with a degree in fine art from a small Catholic women's college. I had my senior show - an installation of large ceramic and mixed media sculpture. But as much as I enjoyed clay and building things out of it, my first love was, and always will be, color.

Painting classes were a joy. Like a musician with perfect pitch, I could mix colors on my palette easily and with great skill. There has never been any amount of hesitation for me, no "hmm...a little more blue maybe? or is that green?" The color already existed in my head. I could remember colors and duplicate them days later...and when my colors were in close proximity on the canvas, I could physically feel their rightness when everything was harmonizing beautifully together.

My color-love has revealed itself in unusual ways, post art school. In my large collection of art supplies I have a box of Sharpie markers, every color ever made. I have many unworn eyeshadows and nail polishes that I bought just because I want to look at their color. My mother calls me when she wants a new color for the bathroom walls, Mike quickly learned that no, a teal shirt does not go with olive pants even though they are both green (thank goodness I woke up early that day and caught him before he left for work), and now that I shoot - I like colored guns.

(♥ cuteness! ♥)

New to the world of firearms, I've been having trouble understanding why some people have issues with guns that are any other color than black or silver. I liken this to how my husband insists that his blue jeans be Levi's - it's a sort of traditional purism, a Zen-like desire for simplicity, and an adherence to function over form. I acknowledge the beauty of firearms for what they are - tidy little marvels of design and engineering - but I can also appreciate the desire for a more decorative gun.

Customized guns should be applauded since they are a sure sign that more people are becoming interested in shooting and gun ownership. A person willing to spend the amount of money it takes to paint their gun Hello Kitty pink, have it engraved, or even give it a neon orange flame-job is a person who wants to tell the world, "This gun is mine." - and people will protect what belongs to them.

Thanks to technology and a greater diversity of gun owners, the 2nd Amendment will now be protected in technicolor.