The Way I See Things.....

The Way I See Things

I didn't realise that I perceive the world in a different way to the majority of other people until fairly recently. I thought everyone saw colours in music and letters. I thought everyone could taste the flavour of names. And it never dawned on me that the “Average Joe” didn't think of individual letters and numbers as each having a distinct personality. It was only after I made a comment about a certain piece of music being a certain colour that it was pointed out to me that evidently things were not perceived by others as they are by myself. “June, are you OK?” was the comment. Then I discovered this “thing” had a name. Synaesthesia. In Greek it means “a union of the senses”, and according to Scholarpedia, it affects 4% of the global population. It is not a neurological condition, but is often seen as a “gift” that only a few people can take advantage of. So in a way I'm kind of special – or so I like to think!

Trawling research on the web, there appears to be 54 types of synaesthesia, appearing equally in men and women. There are also suggestions of a family link. I have to admit as to not having read an abundance of material about it, but I seem to have several different synaesthetic experiences that occur in different ways in everyday life. Some people have asked me to share these, so here goes......and honestly, I am not mad!

Colour and Personality associations

I have always thought of days of the week as colours: Monday is Yellow; Tuesday is Orange; Wednesday Green; Thursday Purple; Friday Pink; Saturday Red and Sunday is Blue.

I have very strong likes/dislikes of colours, and have always liked Wednesdays the least, as I really don't like green. Sometimes, without thinking about it, I will wear clothes whose colour corresponds to the day of the week - at least when that happens I don't forget what day it is!

As well as days of the week having colours, individual letters and numbers have their own colours. This used to make spelling tests and maths a lot of fun when I was a child, as I seemed to form a rainbow of colours on the page when I wrote things down. To further complicate things, these individual letters and numbers each have a distinct personality as well....

NUMBER	COLOUR	PERSONALITY
1	Red	Fun, light-hearted
2	Blue	Naughty/mischievous
3	Yellow	Drunkard
4	Green	Elderly
5	Orange	Happy, slightly smug
6	Pink	Nervous/highly-strung. Easily scared
7	Purple	An Academic
8	Black	Banker
9	Brown	Bored teenager
0	Grey	Ghostly/shadowy

And the same with the alphabet whether in upper or lower case:

LETTER	COLOUR	PERSONALITY
A	Red	Perfectionist
B	Magenta	Shy
C	Orange	Lazy
D	Light blue	Easily bored
E	Yellow	Fitness freak
F	Indigo	Flippant
G	Silver	Self-confident
H	Dark Green	Earthy
I	Grey	Snob
J	Gold	Outgoing
K	Purple	Untidy
L	Pinky orange	Sleazy
M	Green	Bipolar/Moody
N	Dark Grey	Geeky
O	Peach	Singer
P	Beige	Rebellious
Q	Terracotta	Dependent
R	Olive Green	Adventurer
S	Dark blue	Jolly
T	Baby pink	Pretentious
U	Lilac	Caring
V	Dark red	Aristocratic
W	Pink	Excitable
X	Turquoise	Eccentric
Y	Amber	Introverted
Z	Black	Sad

Strangely enough, in my case, individual letters and numbers do not have their own tastes – whereas the words they form often do. More of that later.

I do have an irrational dislike to certain letters of the alphabet.... I would refuse to buy a used car if it had a P or U on its number plate. Unfortunately for me, the family car we currently have was sold to us with a temporary number plate on it – and when the original was put back on, it had a P among the letters. It may seem crazy, but it gets on my nerves!!!

Are you still with me? It gets better.......

Seeing sounds

When growing up, I wasn't aware of this branch of my synaesthesia. Being a child and young adult who listened to 80s/90s pop chart music via the radio, this link was absent. Synthetic drum machine music didn't evoke any colour associations; neither did Heavy Rock. In saying this, however, I do recall Nena's song “99 red balloons” confusing me, as the song was yellow in my opinion. New Order's “Blue Monday” definitely was not blue – it was an emerald green colour. It was not until I started listening to classical music that the whole kaleidoscopic spectrum of patterns made themselves evident. For instance: Taverner's “The Lamb” and Vaughan-Williams' “Fantasia on a theme of Thomas Tallis” are what I call sunset songs – when I hear them I visually see orange, golds, pinks and a hint of navy blue weaving mellow patterns in my mind. Paganini is a light blue, summer sky with wispy white clouds. Vaughan-Williams' “The Lark Ascending” is a definite green piece – and because of its colour I don't like it! Karl Jenkins Adiemus pieces are composed of most colours in darkened hues, but never black, with the odd slither of gold or silver. Beethoven's music tends to be darker; Mozart produces playful pastel shades. Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition is of the Cubism art genre with the three primary colours only featuring, in bold form. Einaudi is similar to Mozart – bright and pastel shades of the lighter colours in the spectrum, often in a gingham-style pattern. More on Einaudi later – he is more complicated! In fact, I cannot drive my car with classical music playing, or else I wouldn't be able to “see” properly, and would likely end up in a crash!

Aside from classical music, the only other obvious colour – music synaesthetic experiences I have had have been whilst listening to the rock group Pink Floyd, which is interesting as the Founder of Pink Floyd, Syd Barrett, is thought to have been a synaesthete. The “Dark Side of the Moon” album is an extraordinary cacophony of pink, purple, burgundy and blue with other bold colours darting in and out of the patterns – but these colours are always blurred.

In an orchestra, groups of instruments emit different colours – I also tend to group them into temperature....don't ask me why!

INSTRUMENT	COLOUR	TEMPERATURE/MOOD
Violin	Pale blue	Cool/lightweight, wispy
Cello/double bass	Brown	Tepid/Stark, earthy
Flute	Green	Cool/lush, damp
Oboe/clarinet/bassoon	Olive green – dark green	Cool/damp, dreary
Trumpet/trombone	Dark red – crimson	Warm/outgoing, self-important
French horn/tuba etc	Red	Cool/ sharp
Piano	Pastel shades/gingham pattern	Warm
Harp	Gold/orange	Warm/flowing
Xylophone	Silver	Cool/Sharp, frosty
Choral	Dark yellow/orange/pink	Warm
Guitar	Yellow	Warm/sunny

Seeing sound is an extremely relaxing and pleasant experience (unless one is driving) and I wish that everyone could share it. It's like having your own son et lumiere show in your mind!

Tasting sounds

Tasting words and sounds doesn't happen to me as much as the seeing sounds does. On listening to an Einaudi album recently, every piece tasted of a different pastry, cake and even lemon meringue pie! By the end of the album I felt as if I had eaten a whole baker's shop, and didn't want any lunch. That has not happened on any other classical album, yet, but it was pretty amazing at the time!

Names and how I experience them

My facebook and twitter pages are ablaze with sounds and tastes just by looking down my friends' lists. Some names are tastes, some are sounds, some are moods or colours and some are objects. Some are pleasant, some are not. Most are rather silly and amusing. Here are some examples. If your name is among these, please do not be offended by how things appear to me – I can't help it! (I'm picking names at random from friends' lists here....).

The name Graham tastes of liver, whereas Lesley is freshly squeezed fruit juice. Lucy is a squeaky supermarket trolley wheel, Sheila has the sound of a lavatory flushing (sorry!). Emma is a misty summer morning at dawn, while Eve is a dark wintry evening round the fire. Steve is bass guitar, Sam is a tambourine. The name Dave conjures up corduroy material, whereas Darren is plastic and Emily is lace. There is no rhyme nor reason for these associations – it is how I experience the senses that make up the names. So if your name is Sarah, I would remember you as a hairbrush. See, I warned you some of them were ridiculous!

So, in a nutshell, that is my “take” on the world. I see all this as a positive thing – in fact, if my synaesthesia was somehow taken away from me, I would miss it hugely. I only wish more people could enjoy the world with this “extra sense” - it brings things into a whole new dimension. And no, I'm not mad!