Childhood Of The Art Historian, parts 428 - 431

428. The policeman got on his intercom and said "Be on the lookout for a boy in a green jacket."

429. Green jacket!? Was the policeman an idiot; was he deaf? I had said a chartreuse and black checked hunting jacket, and he reports a green jacket.  Then I had a revelation, I had color acuity, and probably the policeman did not have color acuity, this was an example of the serious importance of my unique skill.

430. Realizing the policeman probably did not have color acuity was a great revelation to me, but it raised very serious problems for my childish mind to cope with. I realized that there is never a way to know just what another person sees, when they are seeing red! And if you describe a color with words, you may satisfy yourself that your description has meaning, but you can never have any idea what is in someones mind.

431. In my book on the color red I tried to explain this problem of not knowing what someone else sees, when they say that are seeing the color red. It was a hard idea to explain back when I was in grade school, but I gave it a try. I expected to flunk my book report, because I wrote a book instead of reading one, but my art teacher gave me an A+.