A Box Of Crayons

PAUL
There’s nothing worse than this incessant grayness.

DANNY
Oh yeah. You mean like the clouds are gray? The concrete is gray? The street is dark gray? You mean like that?

PAUL
Yeah, I mean like that.

DANNY
That car over there is light gray…or would you call that silver?

PAUL
What?

DANNY
That car. Is it silver or gray?

PAUL
Umm, it’s silver gray.

DANNY
Like the colors in a big box of crayons, you know?

PAUL
Shades of gray in crayons? What are you talking about? There ain’t no shades of gray in any box of crayons I ever seen!

DANNY
Oh. Sorry… What are you so touchy about anyway? I just meant, you know, like “Yellow Green” and stuff like that.

PAUL
Yeah, well there ain’t no yellow green in this box of crayons, okay?!

DANNY
No. No green at all. No any shade of green. Green’s kind of a Spring color.

PAUL
Yeah, right.

DANNY
Spring and summer.

PAUL
Yeah.

DANNY
Hey, I have a green plant in my apartment!

PAUL
Stop it! You’re not cheering me up.


DANNY
I don’t know, man. It kind of cheers me up. You know? I’m just saying there are shades. Shades of gray and shades of green…doesn’t that cheer you up?

PAUL
No. That does not cheer me up.

DANNY
Well you’re just being difficult. That’s a very reassuring thought.

PAUL
Oh yeah. In what way?

DANNY
Well, in the way…in the way that everything isn’t black and white.

PAUL
I’m not so sure about that.

DANNY
What? You think everything is black or white?

PAUL
In a way, yes.

DANNY
But what about all the different shades of gray?

PAUL
That’s just black and white that are on the way.
DANNY
On the way to what?

PAUL
On the way to being black or white. In transition like.

DANNY
Yeah, but if that was true, then everything would end up either being black or being white. And that’s not how it is. In fact, I think there are more shades of gray than there is black and white.

PAUL
No, no, no. Everything is in transition. Even the black and white.

DANNY
That’s deep.

PAUL
The black fades to gray and the white fades to gray, and then they all fade all the way back again.

DANNY
So the white ends up black and the black ends up white, but only for a while.

PAUL
Something like that, yeah.

DANNY
Wow. That happens all the time in my laundry, man. The white shirts turn gray and the black jeans turn gray, and the underwear turns gray.
PAUL
Alright, alright. I don’t need to know the details.

DANNY
I’m just saying. But I guess it’s not really the same.

PAUL
Oh? How so?

DANNY
Well the laundry. It seems like everything just ends up the same drab shade of gray in the end, and then it stays that way.

PAUL
We’re not talking about laundry, you dummy. Jeez. Sometimes you can be really thick, you know that?

DANNY
Well, you don’t have to be mean about it. And anyway, I am not dumb. I just see things different, that’s all.

PAUL
Yeah, I know. Your whole world is just like a box of crayons. Yours just need to be sharpened, but all the colors are there.

DANNY
Yeah.

PAUL
I wish I could say the same for myself.
DANNY
What do you mean?

PAUL
I think I’m missing a few colors.

DANNY
From your crayon box?

PAUL
Yeah, from my crayon box.

DANNY
Oh, what colors are you missing?

PAUL
Well, right now I’m really missing blue.

DANNY
Oh, I get it! You’re missing blue because the sky is so gray, right? Instead of being blue. Is that what you mean?

PAUL
Yeah. That’s it alright. You’re not so dumb after all.

DANNY
I told you I’m not dumb!

PAUL
That’s what I said.
DANNY
Oh, okay. So what do you want to do now?

PAUL
You know what I wonder?

DANNY
What?

PAUL
I wonder why they call the blues the blues.

DANNY
I know about the blues.

PAUL
Yeah?

DANNY
Yeah. My Mom used to get the blues. All the time. That’s what she said, you know? She said, “Danny I’ve got a bad case of the blues.” And then she’d have another drink.

PAUL
Oh.

DANNY
Yeah. And later I’d put her in bed. So one time, I wanted to see what it was like, you know?

PAUL
Oh you did?

DANNY
Yeah, so after I put her to bed, I had some drinks. Boy did I ever have the blues that night!

PAUL
You think so?

DANNY
It was bad. It was really bad. And there was nobody there to put me in bed.

PAUL
Uh oh. So what happened?

DANNY
So I slept on the floor. The next day Mom was mad because I drank her Scotch. But I told her not to worry, I would never do that again.

PAUL
Oh really?

DANNY
No way. I didn’t want to have the blues like that again.

PAUL
Danny boy, you lead a charmed life.


DANNY
I do? What does that mean?

PAUL
It means you will never ever get the blues again, buddy. Not like me.

DANNY
You mean you don’t have a charmed life?

PAUL
Not even a little bit. Nope. I have a cursed life.

DANNY
Whoa. That sounds like something bad.

PAUL
Yeah, well it’s a double-edged sword.

DANNY
Oh, you mean like cursed on one side and charmed on the other?

PAUL
Ha ha. Very funny.

DANNY
So like the white and the black?

PAUL
What?

DANNY
Like the white and the black. The cursed and the charmed. Fading into each other?