I want to get back into the habit of writing (and posting here, bi-weekly at least), so I’m going to start out again by setting the bar low with this random rambling about red that I wrote in a tired daze a couple of nights ago.
Oh, and if you’re curious where I’ve been lately, I’ve been keeping a travel blog as I trekked around Cambodia. 🙂
Red. A colour, an emotion, life. Red runs through our veins, red burns in our cheeks when we’re angry or embarrassed or cold, red envelops us when we close our eyes against a bright light, red tells us to stop, red tells us something is hot, red tells us when the day is dawning or dusking, red warns us and cautions us and alerts us of danger or other important information. Red is not just a colour. Red may be all these things and more, or it may mean something different entirely for you than it does for me. Red represents something. When we see it in one context, it might tell us to stop. In another context, it might tell us to go, to run to safety, or to seek help. Or it might just be a colour. A tool in a designer’s arsenal, serving no purpose besides decoration.
Enveloped in red, what would we see? Red? Or would our eyes adjust? Having no perceivable pattern to interpret, no change in shade or hue, would our eyes still tell us what we’re seeing is red? How could we know? Would we instead see that which red represents to us? Would we see love – that is, would we feel love? Would we see, or feel, anger? Would we be inspired? Or would we be afraid? Would we remember what colour is, when red is all we see? The same might be said of any colour, but red is special. It’s the largest visible wavelength, and I believe it’s the colour that we most often perceive, consciously or subconsciously, exclusively or compositely, deliberately or accidentally.
If you were colour-blind and couldn’t see the colour red, would you still perceive red? You might not perceive the colour as others do, but perception is only partially sight – the rest is interpretation. You can certainly still feel what red represents: heat, anger, love, and so on. So you could assign your own definition of red arbitrarily, without even realising, and you’d be none the wiser until someone told you that you’re colour-blind.
Observations 