Colorblind by Adam Boenig

Image by Andrew Clifton-Brown

The colors use to mean something to him. Everywhere, shades of red and blue and purple and green; the streak of the headlights as the cars sped down the highway, as the sun painted the sky in its setting.

Now, there was nothing. It did not matter what colors there were; all was gray, and, in a very real sense, all was lost.

Jared was, at one time, a painter. Not a famous one, mind you; but he made enough to get by, and it gave him joy. it was a simple life; he would go out with his easel and canvas and paint landscapes, or sunsets, or people. All these colors flashing before him, onto his brush and onto paper, even more vivid than reality.

Then it happened. One day, late, he went to a new place; a quiet corner. Something happened; a chemical spill, something, there was a child involved and...

Well, he was lucky, in a sense. He survived. But he lost the colors; they didn't come to him any more. All his pigments, his tubes of oils, only saved by the labels.

It was months later that he finally started painting again. it was a strange experience, painting on his balcony without seeing the colors. He used his brush, and his labeled tubes, to paint the sunset as he remembered it; unable to see the colors, he only had guesses and ideas.

It was the most unusual, perhaps surreal, thing, he had ever done.

Later, when he showed iot to his friends. They were shocked; not by how bad, but by how well it was done. The vivideness, the shades, the almost serene quality about his first sunset.

In a way, his inability to see made his painting even more real.

Dedicated to Spoony McMooch