Sometimes people will come into the library to take pictures, often
for graduation, sometimes for engagement photos, and occasionally for a
third reason*. It's a public building, and we try to be welcoming to people who want to come here, so unless they're shooting a Slasher film or a striptease, they are free to do so. There are some on the second floor doing that right now.
Anyway, at the same time,
there's a guy and a girl moving from point to point throughout the
building taking pictures, ostensibly for some kind of modeling gig
(they're right in front of me now--I guess I could sneak a photo for the
blog, but it's going to be pretty blurry). And I wouldn't even notice
it, except that I still have it in my head that pretty people are better
than the rest of us, and I doubt I'll ever outgrow that mindset, even if I live to be
sixty-five.
Also, I certainly wouldn't be
blogging about it except for one unusual feature--the young model in
question is dressed entirely in black and white, with a long black
jacket, boots, and a long white dress. And her hair is blond on the
right side and completely black on the left, I guess like Cruella De
vil, but what it really reminds me of are those aliens in the "Star
Trek" episode that were black and white in that way, yet had this
ridiculous racist idea that black on the right side was somehow better
or worse than black on the left side.
In the episode (1969's "
Let That Be Your Last Battlefield"),
Frank Gorshin says, "Are you blind, Commander Spock? I am black on the
right side!" The people he hates are white on the right side, and
that's all it takes to not only hate them, but want to exterminate
them.
It's a clunky episode in a lot of ways,
and always pisses people off because it doesn't properly explain race
dynamics or vilify white men enough, but it does get one thing right:
there's no real justification in hating another people, just arbitrary,
invented excuses for it. And that applies in the 21st Century as well
as in the 20th (or the 23rd).
 |
| Another fantastic photo taken by me. Truly, I missed my calling. |
As I was typing
this, the friendliest of the homeless folks that come here daily, Roger,
pointed at the girl through the window and said, "Look, it's Cruella!"
To which, I stood up and said, "Are you blind, Homeless Roger? Cruella
has white hair on the right side. That girl has black hair on the
right side!"
Okay, I didn't actually say that. I just nodded and kept on typing.
*In
fact, there are three about-to-be college graduates standing above me
at this very moment, and if they're not careful, I can see up their grad
gowns.
