Questioning Reality: If we see colours differently, how do we know what green is?

Questioning Reality is an occasional series and is a complete work of fiction.

The views contained herein are nothing whatsoever to do with the author, and instead are based on the views of the character ‘Thom’. Thom is a twenty-year-old fashion designer who likes glittery material. Although, she may be a twenty-year-old fashion model who can’t stand fussy clothing. Or perhaps he’s a 30 year old engineer who likes dancing to Celine Dion.

Names, where necessary, have been changed, but also where necessary, they haven’t.

It’s strange, life.

You go to bed one night (or morning if you’re up all night, for instance a night owl!) and awake to a brand new day. A fresh start. A new beginning. Yet we tend to do exactly the same as the day before. Same work. Same(ish) food. Same mistakes. OK, they’re different, but overall they’re the same…. they aren’t massively different. Be creative, is what I say. Given time. And other things.

Take rubbing stuff, for instance. The medication that either warms up or cools down aches and pains. Say, for example, you had a pain in your neck… or shoulder… or hip… or back… or thigh… or knee… or elbow… or shin… or ankle…  (!) and you used rubbing stuff to ease the pain somewhat. Why does it have no effect on your fingers or hands? That’s very strange, that is.

Why is it when you are desperately trying to find something, you have a rough idea of where you last saw it but it isn’t there. You then go off, demolishing every drawer, cupboard and utensil you can find in said search, and then, in one final act of desperation, you go back to the first place you looked and guess what? There it is. By then, you’ve usually forgotten why you wanted the thing in the first place.

Is perception a fact, or a figment of one’s imagination? If something looks big because it’s close up, but isn’t, can we really, truly, believe what we are seeing? The Sun and the Moon look the same size in the sky, but they aren’t, but in the sky they are. Unless there’s an eclipse, and the Moon totally covers the Sun. Mind you, you can’t see the Moon in an eclipse anyway because it’s New, and then you can’t see anything else for a while for looking at the Sun.

That’s not true entirely. After looking at a bright light, wherever you look afterwards all you can see is a whopping black splotch. But is it black? When you close your eyes, it changes to green – or yellow – or red. Or does it? And as it really isn’t there at all, should it even have a colour? Although it’s probably a good thing that it is there, to serve as a warning to prevent you looking into a bright light in the future.

Still, for all of the strange things life throws at us, there’s always something possibly even more strange waiting to turn up just around the corner. That’s what makes life interesting. That and the every day things that we repeat every day.