Black is Beautiful

I’ve been reading about blogs lately and keep running across experts who say don’t use a black background with white letters for your blog. “They” (?) say it’s too hard to read. The reader’s eyes will get tired.  Oh please (a cliché out of style saying that I’m not really sure exactly what it means. Please who?  The literary police? The slang police? Some obscure word fashionista whose, for no particular good reason, Twitter post determines what’s in and what’s out word wise? But it seems right.) I like the black background with white and orange (a bonus!) letters.  If you can’t read 6 or 7 hundred words without getting tired eyes you need to go to bed earlier or get a $1 pair of reading glasses from the Dollar Store. Are you really not going to read a blog, at least once, because it’s in black and white?  So, unless I get universal comments, Facebook postings, and e-mails begging me to change it,  the black stays. At least till after Halloween.

And speaking of the black is beautiful you were probably thinking I meant – Hallie Berry or Beyoncé’ or Ginny Ralston (tenth grade – Oh man!) Or Denzil Washington or Blair Underwood if your interest swings that way. ‘Nuff said?  Check out Abagond.wordpress.com .

The little black dress.

That dress may lead you to blissfully shooting  stars among the rainbows, or into the black agony of darkness. Depends on who’s wearing it, why they’re wearing it and how much you’ve had to drink/smoke/sniff. Bad things hide in the beautiful blackness. Vampires, except maybe the sparkly ones, hide in the dark. Werewolves come out at night. Evil, human and supernatural, finds the darkness beautiful for that’s when they come out to play and prey. What’s your little black dress for?

Without blackness we wouldn’t have starry skies, or romantic moonlit nights, vamps and weres  notwithstanding, or the excitement of neon lit streets on a warm summer night. No campfires with marshmallows and scary stories. No way to experience the phosphorescence of fish in tropical waters.  Or…?

 And No reason to wear that little black dress. Or the tuxedo that goes with it.  Sigh.

IDEAS

I’m reading The Measure of the Magic by Terry Brooks. It’s connected to his Running with Demons trilogy which are some of my favorite books. In this story a character loses his/her ability to see colors. All is black, white or shades of grey.  I think black would become much more beautiful because its contrast with white  would be much more important. What if you lost that ability. How would you cope? How would it affect your life? See below.

What if you landed on a  screwed up planet where all the people had the same features, but they were different colors and (this is weird) some  colors  didn’t like some other colors. Imagine that! And there were strict customs about which colors one was allowed to associate with. And then you come along, and because you had to pass through a radiation cloud to escape slavers  chasing  you for the harem you were transporting for the Rajha of Ikart you can’t see colors anymore. How would you get along by associating with people of every color? Some colors wouldn’t like it, some would. If you survived, maybe you would leave the world a little more tolerant place, or a total uninhabited wasteland. Your choice.

What if you crash landed on a planet with no sun? Except for sparse starlight all was black. There might be life there. Maybe plants that evolved to not need sunlight to grow. Some animals. If you weren’t rescued for years, how would you survive in the dark? Would your eyes adapt to the blackness? If your space ship survived mostly intact, how would the light from it affect the local wildlife. Attract it? Repel it? If there were sentient beings there would they think you a god, or a devil?

What if you were invisible during the day? At night you were sharp and defined and beautiful. But in daylight you were totally invisible to all. Still substantial, but invisible. A criminal’s dream. But during a walk-in bank robbery you saw a woman/man. You followed them later. Met them at night, fell in love.  A night-time romance is only going to last so long. You have to tell them, show them,  your secret some time. No lies, isn’t that what they always say? How will they take it? Think it’s cool? Think you’re a freak or liar and walk out? Call the Police? You definitely don’t want the government to get hold of you.  If they want to leave, can you let them leave, or  do you love them too much to let them go? Once you tell your secret, how will it end? A happy night-time/kinky daytime lover ending (Would your children be invisible?) or a heartbreaking drag you to the ugliest, blackest depths of despair kind of ending? What’s in your black heart?

What if you were in a totally dark sensory deprivation chamber to relax and let your cares waft away? What if there was something in there with you?

Soothing, scary, sexy, secret,  beautiful, ugly, agony, ecstasy –  black is what you make it. What would you do if you had your choice?

Immortal Love

I’m reading the Sandman series of graphic novels by Neil Gaiman. The series is mostly about “beings” who existed before humanity and will exist after humanity exits the Universal stage.  The Sandman is Dream. His brothers and sisters are Destiny, Death, Destruction, Desire, Despair and Delirium. They are immortal. Though they exist in their own “spaces” they do interact with other “beings” and humans.

Humans die.  Immortals don’t. That’s a problem.

Suppose you were immortal. Not an immortal like a member of a team or a club, not a vampire, or a zombie, or a God/Goddess, or an alien who could go into stasis every once in a while to freshen up their  wrinkles, or a superhero, or a demon, or a regular person with superpowers from being bitten by a mosquito cursed by an African witch doctor.  You are a regular person who at a certain age (you pick) was shunned by Death and Aging. You could not die by any means, including your own hand, someone else’s hand, or any hand associated with nature, fate, religion or the supernatural. You did not age.

And you fell in love. With a mortal.

Not just a regular – Oh this person’s hot and sexy I love you let’s have sex – kind of love. A deep soul cleansing, soul mate kind of love. Someone you could say, “I’ll love you forever,” to, and mean it.  Someone you would happily give your life to save, if you could.

It has to end,  you know it does.  At some point your loved one (spouse or whatever) will figure out that you’re not getting any older and they are. Awkward. How do you handle it?  You could tell them the truth, if you trust them. Loving them does not mean you trust them to keep their mouth shut, especially if they think you’re a creep.  Because even though you are just a regular law-abiding (except for the false IDs and offshore bank accounts) citizen with only that one little secret to hide,  doesn’t mean you want it blabbed about that you can’t die.

Especially if you’re concerned (which you should be) that the “Government” might (they will) find out. Law abiding citizen that you are,  if you’ve been alive any length of time you must have acquired a rather strong skepticism about what the “Government” might do to you if they get their military/scientific mitts on you. Think disappearing into a secret lab in the middle of the desert where they’ll poke and probe you, then, for purely scientific purposes of course, try to kill you to figure you out, then, because they’re scared of you, really try hard to kill you. Failing that, it’s an underground apartment in Area 51 on a very long lease. But, there are two silver linings.  1. If you’ve been clever enough to hide all your money gained over the decades/centuries in interest bearing accounts, you’ll be making money, man.  2. You’ll eventually outlive them. So there, Mr. Soldier Scientist.  BTW, by government I’m not talking about any particular administration (though if it’s Republican at the time you’re really screwed.) I’m talking about all flavors of “Government,” with a big G.

So back to your problem. What to do? Disappear before the question comes up? Disappear after the question comes up? Just go and leave him/her a nice nest egg to  help them get over you? If they love you as much as you love them, maybe they won’t ask and you don’t tell and you go along as if nothing weird is happening. Maybe on their death-bed you can explain? How many times would you have to have that conversation over the years before your tears didn’t get in the way?

On the dark side, there’s always a dark side, especially if your true love doesn’t reciprocate like you think they should, the bitch/bastard. The simplest expedient is murder. By accident, of course. You don’t want some hotshot detective (your love child?) looking into their murder, do you? If you can’t manage murder there’s always solitary confinement in a remodeled basement in a house in the country. Best make sure they’re secure, though. If they escape they could easily make it so you dearly wished you were dead. After all, just because you can’t die, doesn’t mean you can’t hurt. Besides heartbreak, that is.

IDEAS

See above– You have time.