Purple. That’s the color of my love for my bora hued bangtan boys. They entered my life nonchalantly, in shades of lavender and lilac. Mild. Unassuming. I sang along their corny lyrics to Butter with my then tweens and seven-year-old. They were passing clouds then, periwinkle blips in my otherwise drab existence.
I discovered V, my taetae singing Christmas Tree, an original soundtrack in the show Our Beloved Summer. A show that was slow and sweet, tasting of nectarines and sangria. V stayed though, a staple on my playlist long past the slew of shows I breezed through. I went down the rabbit-hole, a deep violet haze that has since consumed me. I learned their names and birth-dates. I read up about their birth places. I knew they had siblings. I bought their biography and devoured it in a day. I went back to 2013 when they debuted as a group and discovered their YouTube channel.
In the iris colored darkness, I belly laughed to their antics and forgot the pressures of raising teens and carrying the mental load of a household of six members. I woke up to sweet voices crooning Black Swan and Microkosmos.
One Christmas morning, I found a mauve poster of my seven boys under the tree. I pinned it up in my study, next to my altar containing Lakshmi and Durga. I paid obeisance, both to the Gods and to my new demi-gods. My para-social relationship with them taking on the sinister hues of mulberry and grape.
Yet another day, I sat at my desk to see a set of orchid colored BT21 stickers on my laptop. I laughed in shades of aubergine, my joy ballooning from the implicit acceptance that this is who Amma was. A little girl trapped in an auntie’s body.
Winter came and with it blues that took on the somber hues of boysenberries. V’s deep baritone in his solo album Layover gave me company as I walked each morning eager to catch the morning sun. His voice warmed me inside while the Sun did it best outside.
Spring brought with it, fun and the hwanggeum maknae Jungkook’s Golden. I bopped along, singing badly. I ordered the album just for the poster and the photo cards. I giggled with my girls as we hid all evidence before Appa came home. Our collective joy was amethyst hued.
One weekend, my middle child and I sat in a theater, the darkness the angsty shade of plum, as Suga filled the screen in front of us, his guttural Haegeum a sensory experience either of us will remember for a lifetime.
Winter came around again, this time an angry shade of violet, devouring my bangtan babies as they were swallowed by the Korean military, away for the next eighteen months. I cried with the rest of my bangtan ARMY and promised to wait, the faithful gomooshins worldwide.
Their music, over 230 songs are on rotation, filling my life and heart with bora hued love. 134340 though, takes the pride of place. Did the world forget purple Pluto even when it was demoted from its status of being a planet?
I wait now, for the eventual reunion, for a time when I can stand with the rest of my virtual friends, in real life, screaming borahae when we see our idols back on stage.
Leave a Reply