“I don’t understand,” I said. I had never heard the word art before. So, naturally, I assumed my grandmother must have been making it up.

“That isn’t a word, Grandma,” I said, but she didn’t look like she was joking.

“Oh, it is,” she said with a smile on her face, “art has been around for years and years, these people just don’t like us to know it exists. For the past fifty years, they’ve made it their mission to make sure that term has been wiped away from society!” She said, throwing her arms up in frustration.

“Who?” I asked. I had no clue who she was talking about. Did she mean the staff here, her fellow elders, or something bigger?

My grandmother was known for making up stories - she used to do it all the time to try and entertain me when I was a little girl. I was afraid she was telling me another story and that I was getting too excited over nothing.

“The government,” she said, her eyes twinkling with an emotion I had never seen before, “why do you think that you only see in dull shades? We’ve been genetically changed to only see the dull shades in color. We’re not allowed to think about things in abstract ways. By now it’s just human nature not to, so we don’t even realize our thoughts are restricted,” she said with a shake of her head.

“Grandma,” I said and she lifted her eyes to look at me, “tell me why they took it away.”

“They took it away because they were afraid people were going to use it to revolt,” she said. “People all around the world were using their art to express their ideas, their opinions, and it got so extreme and large that the government decided that the solution was to take away all things art was a part of.”

“Music,” I said, and her smile grew.

“Music,” she confirmed before continuing. “That was one of the first things taken away - the government banned music. The pop stars and those who earned a living off their failed relationships had no work, and the world had nothing to listen to. For a while people would sing to themselves, hoping for a little relief, but it was never the same. So, eventually, it just died out,” she said with a shrug.

“Failed relationships?” I asked, and she just let out a loud laugh, catching the attention of a few nurses that were around the room.

“Oh, dear, that’s an entirely different story. Let’s just say, some people only know how to write about one thing,” she said with a wink and I smiled a bit. “Once music was taken away, the world was silent. I remember going to school and not hearing anyone speaking. No one knew what to do because they were afraid they would accidently say something that could be considered a violation,” she said sadly, her eyes glossing over.

“People could actually be punished for saying music?” I asked.

“Not saying... singing,” she corrected me. “We were all afraid, for we saw the consequences of breaking the rules on the news. Eventually, there was no news at all, they saw the graphics on the screen and the design that went into writing the reports as too scandalous. So, after music, the news went, and with that went writing, the expression of thoughts and emotions through words,” she said.

“Words?” I asked and she nodded, “even words are art?”

“Words can create stories, universes that we can only imagine. We can paint a picture with words,” she said, and I frowned. I didn’t know the words she was using.

“Visual arts were a more difficult thing to get rid of, for it classifies as many things, but they still did it. They banned art supplies, closed museums of art, and anyone caught would be punished,” she said.

“What are visual arts?” I asked.

“Drawing, painting, sculpting, creating things that you can see,” she explained. “It’s like if I took a pencil and drew a picture of you and me, that’s visual arts,” she said, and I smiled.

“That sounds like fun. Why would they want to get rid of it?” I asked.

“Once again, the government believed it would spark erratic behavior, that it would cause people to have too much power in expressing their ideas,” she said, “but there’s a few of us who still have it in us, and we strive to get others to see it,” she said as she looked around.

“What do you want them to see?” I asked. That seemed to be the only thing I could get out. I didn’t know how to respond to her at all, but I knew what questions I had, and that seemed to be what she wanted me to do.

“The truth,” she said. “There are some things that have been wiped away from us completely, such as the color red. Red resides in so many things, so when it’s wiped away the world becomes much more bland. It lacks warmth,” she explained while picking up a book that was beside her. “What do you see here?” she asked.

“A book,” I said, but that didn’t seem to satisfy her question. “I don’t know, I don’t know the words,” I said, my voice shaking slightly.

This was overwhelming. Suddenly, I was learning about everything that was being held from us. The world around me had never seemed so dull before, but then again, I had no clue what it looked like when it wasn’t like this. Our buildings were all so perfect and exact, like I had noticed before, but now it just made me mad.

Nothing was original or unique, and it drove me crazy.

“It’s red,” she said and I frowned as I narrowed my eyes at the object. “Concentrate hard, you can see it, everybody can. It just takes a lot of concentration to get our brains to notice it,” she encouraged.

I kept staring at the object, trying to see a difference in it from before, but nothing was happening.

“Keep your mind in a happy place, remember something that made you smile,” she said softly, and I bit my lip as she handed me the book so I could hold it.

My mind drifted and I thought of all sorts of things: rolling around in the grass with my brother, baking cookies with my mother and father, helping my mom with her work when she would allow me too. I remembered times when I would play outside on my own and spin around in circles until I fell to the ground, letting out small giggles as my head spun.

I didn’t notice my eyes had closed until my grandmother spoke again.

“Now, open your eyes and tell me what you see,” she said in a quiet tone, almost too quiet.

I slipped my eyes open and feared that nothing had changed, but as soon as I looked at her I saw the difference, and the book that was in my hands fell to the ground with a soft clunk.

Everything was so different - so bright - and my grandmother smiled as she saw the change in my demeanor.

“That’s it. You see it,” she said excitedly. “It can be learned,” she said, almost to herself.

I looked at everything around me. I saw these colors that I had never seen before and nearly fell over in my chair as I tried to see if anything else had changed. The terms and definitions my grandmother had thrown at me were swimming in my head. I didn’t understand all of them but I was starting to see how they mattered.

Nothing was the same as it was before.

The world around me was so different now.

Yet, it was so beautiful.