The World of Colors

10 September 2023

My name is Grigory Aslov. I come from the world of colors.

Ever since I have been trapped in this black and white world, I have pondered over what colors really do mean. Almost everything in my previous world was prettier than it is here – but does that mean colors are just superficial decorations or do they really appeal to something deep within us?

Meh. What a bore. Here comes a lecture. Did you think any of those things? I admit that there are many more important questions, such as how did I come here? Is this a parallel universe? How do I go back? Is this a dream I am forever trapped in? Trust me, I have asked these questions again and again and tried everything in my power to find the answers. When action is pointless for a man, philosophizing is his only source of comfort.

It all began when I woke up on the morning of 7^th September 2023. I wasn’t really sure I had woken up, because everything I saw in my room was either black, white or gray. I rubbed my eyes again and again, and every time I opened them, it was the same. I went and looked outside my huge window, everything outside was colorless too. I jumped back to my bed and forced myself to take a nap. I woke up again in the same world.

I tried to call my father, but I saw that there were no contacts on my phone. Frustrated, I went outside, and stood on the pavement, watching the crowds zoom by. I realized, to my horror, that this street was completely different. New shops had sprung up, with shopkeepers I had never seen before. No face that I saw in the street had any resemblance to those I was used to seeing at this time while sipping my morning coffee outside.

I immediately went to the nearest doctor clinic.

“I can’t see any colors suddenly. All I see are black, white and gray.”

“Well, those are the only colors humans can see.” The doctor said, smiling, as if answering a child.

“What about red, blue, green and others?” I asked, frowning(also like a child, admittedly).

“I don’t know what you are talking about. But in any case, I will check your eyes.”

My eyes turned out to be fine. I remember going outside, standing in the middle of the road, as people zoomed past me on either side and thinking – Is this going to be my world forever?

11 September 2023

The sunset in black and white is really underwhelming. So is rain. Thunder. The Sun. The flowers. It feels like the life has been sucked out of every one of these things. The evenings, especially are steeped in an oppressive gloom.

Every night before going to bed, I hoped I would wake up back in my colorful world.

I never did.

Eventually though, I found a job, as a writer for a newspaper. I even made some friends. I started thinking less and less about colors. Perhaps colors were just a form of diversity, adding richness to the world, and nothing more. A diversity in daily life tasks, in feelings and in people would bring about the same effect.

People here have never seen or heard about colors. There are no painters. Differences between people’s appearances are subdued. People generally appear to be more grim here, or maybe that is just my impression.

11 February 2024

I met a beautiful woman. My world is still black and white, but it feels like she has brought back in it all the colors that there were. She is my light in this grim world.

Colors really were superficial things! I don’t miss them in the least anymore. I really prefer this world, where people, being less distracted by superficial colors, focus more on what is truly deep and significant. People in this world, and my darling in particular, have active minds that are constantly engaging in complex and fascinating ideas. They read way more books. The novels spend less time on superfluous descriptions and more on concrete feelings and thoughts. Even the cooks focus more on making food taste better rather than make it look better!

It almost feels like this is where I have always belonged. I am sometimes even seized by the terror that I will be taken away, back to the superficial world of superficial colors and superficial people.

I pray to God that whenever I wake up in the morning, I am still in this world.

19 December 2024

She died.

I am just back from her funeral. I was so glad that the world was colorless today. In my original world, the yellow sun keeps shining, the blue, pink flowers keep blooming happily, even when inside, I am in hell. Colors are oppressive, and cruel, trying to tease me with an idea of a world that I will never have. I hate colors with every fiber of my being!

I have always believed that life was nothing but a sequence of miseries interspersed with a few happy moments here and there. At least this world looks like what it is. The other one deceives you with all its bright colors into thinking that there is less suffering than there actually is.

Dear God, if you ever send me back to your ‘beautiful’ world, I promise that I will stab my own eyes, and live a blind man until my death.

20 February 2025

I had a dream last night. I relived all my memories with her, but she and everything around her had acquired colors. The white wedding dress, with the red lipstick, the bouquet of yellow tulips in hand, the sun shining behind her, the river glittering, her white teeth, her gorgeous smiling face. I remember waking up in the middle of the night and sobbing. I hadn’t shed a tear for two months.

21 February 2025

I think I understand now.

Colors are not mere surface decorations, they stir something deep within our hearts. This feeling can range from being extraordinarily beautiful to unbearable torment. I find this world perfect because deep in my heart, I am a pessimist.

No doubt that seeing her laugh by the river on our wedding day was the happiest moment of my life. When I saw the same thing in colors in my dream, I was even happier. When the colors are in exact harmony with what lies in the depths of your heart, there’s a resonance. You feel extraordinary bliss. When the colors are in perfect disharmony with your heart, you feel torment. That’s what colors are. Beautiful and yet also, cruel.

21 April 2025

I have returned to work. Life has mostly returned to what it was like before I met her.

I sometimes talked about colors with my friends, by telling them to imagine different pitches of sounds, and then a symphony of them, and then trying to translate this concept to the visual field. I used to speak with a bright smile on my face, until I realized that the others actually found the topic boring.

I have stopped talking about colors. Even though they occasionally come to me in my dreams, I have accepted that I am going to die here in this black and white world, in a black and white room, (hopefully) surrounded by black and white people.

I have always wondered if there are others like me out here, who come from the same place that I do. Someone I could talk about the colorful world with. Reminisce together our lost home. My best friend John, who is also a journalist, recently brought up a story about a person in a psychiatric hospital, who claims to have come from another world which looked wildly different. When John asked him to describe his world, he only mumbled something unintelligible. Perhaps he is just sick, but this is my first real shot at discovering a fellow immigrant.

I have a meeting with him tomorrow. I am going to waste no time. If he is in the same situation as me, he will immediately understand when I greet him and say:

My name is Grigory Aslov. I come from the world of colors.