#4. Black Waltz

David de la Mano
(Spain)

The couple (Alice and Bob, of course) orbit around a black hole but she fails to cling to the safety cable and freely falls into the monster. According to the laws of general relativity, Bob is looking at that (kind of uncomfortably) from an accelerated frame of reference (his orbit); Alice is free falling (kind of shitting in her space suit). It takes Alice, from her own frame of reference, just a few seconds to be swallowed and dismembered by the black hole. However, Bob sees her spiraling into the black hole boundary without ever falling inside, just turning slower and slower, to be forever stuck to the event horizon, idle, frozen.
How many people undergo a self destructive path into depression and auto annihilation while their partners don’t seem to realize. They just contemplate a person that, well, right, does not engage too much but does not seem to have more problems other than being today slower than yesterday.
Different frames of reference. We should understand the physics of the frames of reference of our friends and partners, and jump in there with them from time to time, alienate ourselves into the others, feel the acceleration to other bodies, and enjoy the ride. We may come back to our frame stronger, better. Some say even younger, but that’s another story.