Murky Dismal and Rainbow Brite

So my friend and I watched the first part of an episode of Rainbow Brite the other night. It was fantastic. A total flashback to the wonders of an 80’s childhood. It made me think about how I was Rainbow Brite for Halloween when I was four – my mom made me this incredible costume, complete with the boots and the belt. Now I didn’t have the hair that she did, and I wasn’t able to create rainbows or ride the “most magnificent horse in the universe”, but that didn’t matter, because for a day I was able to bring color to a darkened world and I had the outfit to prove it.

Twenty-three years later, I often find myself still believing that I’m Rainbow Brite. I like to think of myself as a realist, but really, I just like to imagine. I like to create solutions and solve riddles and believe in the impossible. I like to maintain that the world contains more possibilities than we can see and, most of all, I like to believe that I am capable of bringing new life and color to it, with or without that spectacular color belt.

But here’s the problem: Rainbow Brite knows what the cause of the darkness and dreariness is. She knows what problem she has to solve, and it’s in the form of Murky Dismal and his sidekick Lurky, and they can often be found driving around in their Grunge Buggy with some sort of “gloom” potion. What’s required of her is to bring color into the world despite these villains’ best efforts. But in the real world, the challenges aren’t so well-defined.

And so sometimes I find Murky’s cloud of gloom to be a bit disorienting. Because it’s not about fighting off an enemy or two. And it’s not about finding all of the different color sprinkles and all of a sudden color is reintroduced to the world. There aren’t clear lines between what’s good and bad, and there’s no final “goal” to aim for. So then the question is: how does someone who still believes in the ability of dreams use that imagination to actually dissipate the murkiness this world sustains?