This is not my brain on drugs, this is your brain on drugs

Here is something that is cool: synesthesia.

Having studied English literature, it is a term that came up a lot. Writers are forever mixing senses, sometimes to better describe a certain feeling or object.

Most people, when they hear the term synesthesia, think of people who can listen to music and "see" it as colours, or see shapes dancing in the air after hearing a particular sound. Or some such. Personification is another type, wherein a number or letter "behaves" a certain way.

Myself, I attribute personalities to letters and numbers (I had a particularly hard time in elementary school math; I didn't like adding 2 and 7 together because I knew they didn't get along because 2 is weepy and whiney, and 7 is assertive and can't stand that kind of thing). and taste words. Not all words; "the" doesn't taste like anything. Neither do other small words like "it", "a", "some", etc. Mostly it is people's names, or verbs or adjectives. The name Jesse tastes like water chestnuts. When I say, "Jesse", I can taste and almost feel, physically, the delicately crunchy and slightly sweet little water vegetable in my mouth.

I only realized a few months ago that this was a "thing", that it doesn't happen to everyone. I was listening to Ideas (at least I'm fairly certain it was Ideas) and there was a discussion about synesthesia. The host of the show was speaking to a woman who was describing the taste of certain words. She said that certain parts of long words (she used "multisyllabic" as an example of a long word that has different tastes for each syllable). As I was listening to this, I found it interesting but I didn't realize at first that she was describing something that is not particularly common. It felt really awesome to realize that my brain does something that most people's brains don't do. I suppose my brain already works a little differently that what is common, seeing as I have bipolar disorder. Somehow synesthesia is a way more enjoyable thing to think about. After listening to Ideas that day I googled "synesthesia" and learned more about it. That was when I realized the way I see numbers and letters is also a little out of the ordinary. I just always assumed everyone felt that they have distinct personalities.

I have made a point, since my discovery, to tell people what things taste like. Everyone likes to know what their name tastes like. Some things have a taste that it takes me some time to identify. For example, the name "Leigh" has a taste but I really had to think about it hard in order to figure out what I was tasting (it is the taste of chewing on a popsicle stick after the popsicle is all gone and there is no flavour left).

Some words have tastes or sensations that I think are very obvious. The word "Europe" tastes like maple syrup; the words sound similar, and I find this happens often, sometimes with strange results. The word "credit" tastes like nothing, really, but when I say the word I can feel something in my mouth like I am holding a debit or credit card between my teeth, and biting down.

The word "blog" tastes like plain, unsweetened yoghurt. Don't know why that is.

I think it is pretty nifty that my brain does this on its own, while some people only get to experience feelings like this if they are on really good drugs.