synesthetic moments and the future of the past

i'm fascinated by the notion of synesthesia. probably because i first learned about it in a russian context. i think it was in nabokov's speak, memory, that i first encountered the condition. as wiki puts it: it's a neurological condition in which stimulation of one sensory or cognitive pathway leads to automatic, involuntary experiences in a second sensory or cognitive pathway. for many people, this means that they see numbers or letters as colors or hear sounds as colors. it's something you are just born with and which isn't that understood. you can't make yourself have it and many people don't realize they have it until they realize that others don't see or hear colors in the same way.

i have a mild case of it - often getting an impression of a color from music and definitely getting strong color flashes from various emotions. this one must be more common, or there wouldn't be phrases like, i saw red for angry moments. i see color less in anger and more in moments of deep love and happiness and contentment - and they are generally warm blue-greens (probably why i painted my blue room blue), tho' i also see deep, rich purples and sometimes yellow and orange.

anyway, synesthesia continues to fascinate and when i came across this performance of russian composer scriabin's attempt at composing a synesthetic symphony, i had to share it.

russian composer scriabin's prometheus: poem of fire
an unfinished, unrealized synaesthetic work (he meant for it to be performed in the himilayas).
performed instead in a concert hall at yale.
i love how anna gowboy, the scriabin scholar behind the project, put it:
 "tonight is the future of the past."

a version of it was also done at the university of iowa sometime in the 70s.
but lasers have come a long way since then.

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fantastic images by edward burtynsky. 

check especially his shipbreaking photos from bangladesh.

thanks bill, for the link!

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do you know where your antipode is?

coffee after 4 p.m.

maybe it was too much coffee, but i am feeling that feeling that comes over me every so often. the feeling that i can't sleep because it would be a waste of time. there's so much to do and create. so many thoughts to get down on paper. so much knitting to be learned. so much beauty to be created. so many memories to be preserved. so much life to be embraced. there's no time for sleeping.

the world is full of inspiration. the crocus are already in bloom. the air is filled with the very texture of spring. it awakens feelings of invincibility--i can clean, i can organize, i can make things, i can cook, i can paint, i can write, i can knit (ok, that was going a little too far). i don't need sleep. to sleep would be to waste this feeling, to lose my grasp on it. the feeling has a strong green color--a spring green--i note this because i'm working on strengthening and broadening the band of my synesthesia.

a note about synesthesia (tho' you can go read the wiki link yourself)...dictionary.com defines it as: a sensation produced in one modality when a stimulus is applied to another modality, as when the hearing of a certain sound induces the visualization of a certain color. my experience of it most often comes with smells--i get a strong visual of a color with certain smells. but it can also be more abstract--a feeling can give a strong sensation of color for me. i'm working on tuning into those moments, as i think it happens more often than i realize, but because it's second nature to me, i'm not always conscious of it.

they say it runs in families. i think my sister has the number version of it--where she sees something in certain number combinations (2s and 7s anyone?).

anyway. it's an interesting notion. and it seems to be keeping me up this evening....

out of focus colors

as we close in on the summer holiday, i'm feeling a bit fuzzy to say the least. it's been a long haul, these past months. it's really hard when a job you dearly love turns sour, but it so often happens in a time of growth and disruption. i love both growth, disruption and also change, but it's been a bit ridiculous of late. when the wrong people are brought in and the good people leave and the company culture changes radically, it creates change that's not good or productive. i'm ready for a holiday. and happily, we are getting on a plane next week. it also helped that i went to an intimate and utterly blissful yin yoga class today. my mind quieted down and i saw a veritable rainbow of colors during some of the long poses. it centered me and put me, at least momentarily, in touch with my body. this color thing is really interesting. i've had flashes of synesthesia over the years, but it's really started to show itself in new ways during my recent bodywork sessions. i need to learn what the colors mean, even if it's only what they mean for me...i saw everything from rich, bright, vibrant red - it's never just one uniform color, there are nuances - to salmon to yellow and orange to green and teal to the most velvety indigo. my sense of it is that it's when i'm in touch with emotions, or more like touching them, as i wouldn't say i could articulate them. i've read some pieces about colors associated with the chakras and perhaps there's also something of that in it, when one or another is activated, but it feels more connected to some kind of emotional bedrock inside me. one which i've been probably out of touch with for far too long. if i ever was in touch with it. but i have hope, with the appearance of all these colors when i'm doing bodywork or yoga, that i can get in touch, maybe also at other times. maybe it's just a reminder that i need to live a more colorful life. but first...vacation.

a magical color show of the mind

this photo of kusama's gleaming lights of the souls that's at louisiana museum of modern art is the closest i could get to an experience i had last evening. i had an MRI scan of my back. that meant lying very still for half an hour, listening to dire straits. then, the tech came in and said he'd like to do a second scan higher up, after seeing the nerve issues in my knee, which took another 20 minutes or so. it seems that i very likely have a herniated disc and maybe even two, tho' i won't know for sure until i see the doctor on monday. but, enough about that.

the MRI called forth my weak synesthesia - and during the whole thing, where the magnets did their rotational thing, i saw before my closed eyes, the most amazing color show. it was a wide range of color, from deep, dark purple to rich teal to bright orange with sunflower yellow edges and an amazing salmony peachy color, like a summer sunset. the whole range of color notes, from deep bass to clear, tinkling, dancing high notes. i did wonder if the dire straits was actually what was triggering the color show before my eyes, but when the cd ran out for the last five minutes and the colors continued, i knew it was the machine. it made what might have been a nerve wracking experience, full of strange noises and being uncomfortable and having to be still while being in pain, into a pleasant, relaxing and almost magical one.

i found myself wishing i could take a photo of what i saw there on the inside of my eyelids, but alas, i could not. i may get out watercolors and try to duplicate it, but somehow, it seems like something that i should just preserve in memory - just a little conversation between my brain, my central nervous system and me.

my brain is buzzing

full credit to my sister for this photo. it's early morning purple aurora skies over the old barn from the back steps of our childhood home, which is now her home. purple has always been one of my favorite colors and though i go away from it, i always come back. i recently bought a purple sweater and some very cool purple and gold brocade pants, so it's back in my life. it often figures in the mild synesthesia i have in certain situations - i see swirls of purple and pink, quite like this photo, actually. though sometimes it's purple and peach or purple and green. i think purple comforts me.

my brain is buzzing. i haven't slept well since sometime last week. i might have mentioned that husband is currently driving around in ukraine, delivering all kinds of humanitarian aid. he visited an animal shelter today and delivered a lot of pet food and other supplies. a kind woman has taken in cats and dogs that people had to leave behind as they fled. he said they had 23 dogs and 48 cats and it was immaculate. i'm certain the food he delivered was much appreciated. i get tears in my eyes just writing this. but dang, it's keeping me from getting a good nights' sleep. 

i feel like i'm absorbing all of the anxiety of the world. or channeling it. or something that's hard to describe. it's rather unpleasant. and it isn't conducive to proper sleep or firing on all cylinders at work. maybe i'll feel normal again when husband is home. but maybe i won't. maybe trump will have invaded greenland. maybe that bill to do away with dual citizenship in the US will pass. if it does, i know which i will choose, if only i would get the letter to say it's official.