Changing color of folders

It seems like there should be an easy way to just change the color of folders on the desktop and in Favorites.....why is this so difficult???

Because there is virtually nothing in the OS that can be customized. The visual aspect of the user interface is Apple's branding. They haven't allowed much at all in the way of customization in over 30 years.

OS 7 and OS 9 were more recent than 30 years ago, and I distinctly remember assigning a flushing toilet sound to my empty Trash activity. 😉 Now, if I could only do that with the boot chime on High Sierra...

You can mark folders with different color Tags:

macOS: Use tags to organize files

OS X: Tags help you organize your files

Alternatively you can: How to Change Folder Colors on Mac