Saturday, September 8, 2012

Colors

"Does this come in other colors?"
There comes a time in every dog's life when he just sits in oblivion - a dumb and yet profound realization of self and the surrounding. Insight - it is, perhaps, the most awe-inspiring jewel we can possess. No, I wouldn't dare suggest we are special in any way. I wouldn't dare. It just simply isn't so. We are all petty creatures born of existence - matters culminating in a dire withdrawal, surrounding itself with water and thriving to exist, to maintain the milieu just a moment longer. The thrive continues still and we, still, are the same. Our physical apprehension of the universe - the majestic, and of time - the absolute and our inability to comprehend the matter we are made up of in quantum level, our inability to relate to the theory of relativity some great Jew scientist proposed and our inability to acknowledge 'nothing' at its purest form is, perhaps, far from the actual image the universe radiates through its magnificent self. We are but lowly creatures meant for no big achievement, we are not important. We are not significant.
And, yet we have something special - insight and most of all a curiosity - an ever lasting hunger for knowledge of ourselves and our surrounding, our origins and of what will be of us upon our demise. The notion of 'God' and other imaginary creatures provide us with enough insight to live a lifetime but with growing hunger, with advancing age, we, sooner or later, come to realize that it won't be just for our 'self's. We wish not to delude ourselves but to know the truth - howsoever elegant or mediocre.
There comes a time in every dog's life when he just sits in oblivion. He stares at the ground, breathes and keeps still for a-amount of time after which he walks away in seeming disappointment. We aren't dogs, see. We are not animals. We, once, were but with time we have grown to be so much more and it isn't filling to our conscience to be one again. We are lively creatures - creatures among which some have grown to be some form of glue that holds the notion of social dignity and some who wish to know more and more and more and more. Some grow and go in ignorance. Some grow and go in utter disappointment. And, then, there are few who grow and go in a hue of luminescence - a deprivation from the physical form of life holds them back as much as a byte off of an error log does to a programmer. They go in a brilliance. But, the twig remains - they go nonetheless.
So, despite everything, we are still not a bit more significant than that dog who every once in a while sits and stares without making a sound other than its muffled cry for help - that someone walk up to him and tell him that there is more to life than that piece of bone he's been chasing after - that there is a heaven anticipating his return and his master waiting for him for another round of catch-the-ball. No, we are the same, after all.
The nature of these sorts of quest for insight are dubious. Someone once said, if our conscience were so easy to understand, we would be so simple that we wouldn't be able to understand it. That makes sense. Insight can only reach a maximum level before it collapses on itself.
I once tried reasoning my conscious activities with the sub-conscious. It seemed easy, see. After all, I was in the habit of doing the same with others. Observing what they do and then trying to deduce the working of their sub-conscious. But, alas! if only I could do the same with me. The harder I tried, the more complex it became and not before long I had to give up telling myself this exact line - if I were so easy to deduce an insight from, then perhaps I would be too naive to be able to do it. That day, I tore up all the records I had of those observations I had made over the years. That night - I realized what I am. That night I realized what significance I hold and what I mean in the grand picture. A grain of sand in the desert.
And, yet, today I ask the shopkeeper if an item was available in some other color. Color is, perhaps, the biggest nuisance of all the flaws we have. We can appreciate colors, yes. But, dogs can't. They see in greys. Some fishes do not even possess sight. Therefore, it is perhaps obvious that what we see of light isn't its entirity. It isn't the visual image of the oh-so-divine universe.
It is insight, a mockery to self and a curse for those who possess it. And, yet, the most beautiful jewel that can possess us. But, then there are a few moments of hormonal euphoria that overshadows joy and sorrow alike. Like the count would say after he lost a bride, "hollow", we feel that way. We feel, yes we do. We feel things that are beyond our capacity. We feel anger we cannot define. We feel love we cannot express in words or even any audible sounds. We hear voices in our head - voices so tantalizing, voices so lucid that it is difficult and sometimes impossible even to assume it lies only within our heads. We feel awe we cannot describe. We feel pensive at some rendezvous of memories we can only elicit as words in poems. We write words in rhymes all the while knowing that it will never deliver to its audience what it does to us. We take photographs - trying to capture every precious moments. They will not see the feelings hidden behind that mask. They will not see your delight. They will only see a reflection of what you did. So, what significance does color have after all, I wonder. Does it even have any?
In a prism, a white light collapses into a spectrum. In the same prism, atomic light separates into finer streaks of light. Something so subjective can never lead to a greater good. "Nice Shades"? Ha! Are you sure the color table set in your mind is the same as mine? I mean - what if what you perceive as 'blue' is a different shade of green to me? It sounds almost possible. After all, visual recognition is an acquired character. You have been taught to call it 'blue' and so you call it 'blue'. I might see a different shade and I have been calling it blue. When some object of that particular color comes in front of us, we call it 'blue' unknown to us that we might not be seeing the same color. Maybe that's why we have preference on a particular color. If our basic setting is the same, we should've admired the same color. But, we don't, do we? Say we all were set to like green by default. Now, you might be calling it 'blue', I might be calling it 'cyan' even. So, then our favorites would vary as much as that. You will disdain my 'cyan' not knowing that it is your choice as well - just not in the objective world. It seems as if we are but mere victim of subjective prejudices.
How can colors be so important? Why would I, on any grounds whatsoever, ask the shopkeeper if he has an item structurally and functionally the same but just on different color?