10.18.2007
First off, I'm back from the dentist. It went better and worse than I had hoped. I don't want to talk about it though except to say that my mouth is fucking throbbing like it shouldn't.
And I'm going to have to go back next week. And the week after.
And then I'm going to have my wisdom teeth pulled.
Fucking hell...
Anyway, here's the news. I invented a flag for my world. I realized that, for all the other stuff I'd done - population charts, political systems, presidents, ship names, ship sales figures, naval customs, etc - I'd neglected to invent the most basic symbol of a more-or-less united people.
A flag.
So here it is:
I think it's pretty...
Anyway. It also has a meaning.
Red is the national color of the United Republic of Stars. It was chosen to stand in contrast to the pale (UN) blue of the Universal United Human Authority of Earth (UUHA). The blue is supposed to symbolize the oceans of Earth, hence the darkness, but really it's a stand in for the pale blue. The story goes that no one wanted to have the UUHA represented on their new flag.
The single star on the left represents the Sol Star System - the star around which Earth orbits and therefore the home system of humanity. The eleven stars on the right represent the eleven habitable star systems within the Republican territory. (There are, in fact, fifteen habitable worlds and numerous habitable moons.)
The black bar is representative of the space between Earth and the Republic.
Pretty fucking bad ass, right? Not bad for twenty freak'n minutes of photoshop work, if I do say so myself.
Anyway, the whole thing just makes it easier for me to "feel". Like I knew what they were fighting for, I just didn't know what they were fighting for. Now I can see this flag waving on the planets and on the arms of the sailors of the Republican Fleet and I get it. They're not fighting so much over the red part, or trying to keep the blue part away. They're trying to make sure the black part doesn't get any thinner.
They like being separate and that's what matters to them.
If I was an actor, I'd say that I've discovered my motivation. Since I'm a writer, the truth is, I've found the "world's" heart.
Anyway, I thought I'd share.