I invent a new colour.

I dreamed about it last night, and it is marvelous.

But I don't know how to describe it.

When I look up new colours on the internet, they are all just mixes of current colours– blue-green or yellowish blue, or really, really, black.

My colour is new. No '-ish's, 'and's, or 'but's.

The closest it gets to blue is its loneliness. And it has a bit of the playful curiosity of yellow. But it doesn't look anything like either of them. It's completely new, and the world doesn't seem ready for it. It isn't sufficient to its description.

"Is it a little bit red?" my wife asks when I tell her about it, "I once saw a reddish colour that I didn't know."

"No." I repeat. "There is nothing of red in it, except maybe it's urgency."

"Lonely like blue, and urgent like red." Lucy ponders, "Maybe it is a purple."

"It isn't purple. I would have said purple if it looked purple."

"Not all purples are the same." she says.

"It is nowhere in the range of purple." I say. "It is new, it isn't in the rainbow."

"All colours are in the rainbow, Daddy." Lisa says.

"Not this one." I explain. "It is new."

"Maybe it is a smell." Eunjoo says, "You make all sorts of smells."

"Dammit, woman." I am getting frustrated. "It is a colour. I know smells, and you can't see them. "

"Maybe if it had a name, Daddy," suggests Lisa, "Maybe then it would be easier to talk about."

"Gormel" I said, after some consideration. She is right, it does describe it.

"Oh," says my wife, "It is metallic."

"No." I shake my head.

"Mom!" says Lucy. "Gormel doesn't sound shiny at it all."

I nod my agreement. It isn't the least bit shiny.

"It sounds purple." Lucy continues.

"Why don't you draw it, Daddy?" Lisa suggests.

"We don't have any gormel crayons, Lisa."

"You could just mix red and blue," says Lucy.

I leave. I will always have gormel, but it is just for me. The world will never have this particular delight.