Yellow is Mom’s favorite color.

When we were little, she once stayed up all night painting an entire wall of our living room yellow.

Just one wall.

When Mark and I awoke the next morning, Mom was sitting lotus style in her paint-splattered coveralls on the living room floor. Her back to us, she stared at the wall. She had gathered Mark into the cocoon of her lap and wrapped an arm around my legs. Pulling me close to her side, she kept her eyes on the wall even while she buried a kiss in Mark’s dark curls.