Purple wasn’t the only color lighting up the Purple House in Binghamton this Holy Week.
Five dozen kids of varying sizes, shapes and shades dyed and painted 15 dozen eggs with varying colors, designs and degrees of difficulty.
The light and intermittent spring rain kept them on the porch and in the house, but didn’t dampen their Easter spirit.
“You see how much they love this space and the relationships they have with the people here,” said Erin Harris, founding director of the Carpenter Art Garden and its arts center, the Purple House.
“You can’t help but feel hopeful.”
Hope is light and intermittent for children in this troubled but tenacious street.
Last summer, two men were shot and killed just down the street. One died, the other was paralyzed.
Last October, they watched police looking for a missing 29-year-old search a lot two doors down from the Purple House with cadaver dogs.
The next day, they watched as police used a backhoe to break up a concrete slab on the lot. The woman remains missing.
A week ago, police swarmed the area around Cornerstone Prep and Lester School, just across the street.
The schools closed early because of concerns about retaliation for a murder in the neighborhood two days earlier.
