Blackout #40

Sunshine, like love.

George Barbier, Le Feu (The Fire), lithograph from Falbalas et Fanfreluches, Almanach des Modes Presentes, Passees et Futures, 1925.

when i grow up i wanna be an astronaut

i really, really hope that whenever we actually get to space for real, like past mars, the universe turns out to be exactly as goddamn weird as we have all been expecting all this time. like, space whales past jupiter. palaces of methane ice on pluto. old gods lurking around in the asteroid belt. the ghost of ancient vengeful alien sailors crewing their ghost ships in eternal loops through the oort cloud and sirens off alpha centauri. in a hundred years i want one of my great grandkids to unfurl a holographic map, and look at the little notation hovering a hundred light years past vega that says here there be dragons (no really) and smile, and set sail. 

2016 moodboard

the heavens’ embroidered cloths

from Interstellar, 2014

Sassy David is the best David

Hey kids let’s get meta for a moment.

Let’s say aliens are real, and let’s say we communicate with them, and let’s say they find out about this weird internet thing where humans write little mini stories about future human interactions with aliens.

Can you imagine how fucking confused and concerned they would be? These two-legged assholes who were so enamored with the concept of meeting other intelligent species, even though for the longest time they had NO CONCLUSIVE PROOF that said other species exist, that they wrote stories about those other species, to the point of making up creatures and systems of mood communication and names for their made up aliens? 

Which brings me to my Great Theory About The Purpose Of Storytelling: it’s practice. We tell stories about that time we had the flu really bad to practice getting the flu with our friends so we all know how to properly manage the symptoms. We tell stories about our children to practice dealing with their unpredictability. We tell stories about war and famine and pestilence to practice dealing with disaster. And we tell stories about aliens to practice etiquette for dealing with aliens. 

We tell stories of our own ferocity and ingenuity to practice for the day we have to either defend our planet or invite ourselves into an alliance. We tell stories of our aggressive pack-bonding to practice bonding with creatures that are literally alien to us. We tell stories about trading chores for passage on space ships to practice Just Because They’re Aliens Doesn’t Mean You Can Be Rude. 

And of course, if we can practice bonding and cooperating with creatures that may not even breathe oxygen, we can practice bonding and cooperating with each other.