Synesthesia

[theyellowhobbit]

I was talking to boroparkpyro last night, and I told him how I had recently gotten a new credit card number, and I liked the old one better. I asked if it was normal for someone to like one number better than another if neither of them have any special significance. He said it wasn't weird.

And the reason I like one of the numbers better than the other is because the colors are different.

"Colors?" you might ask. Yes, colors. In my mind every number is a certain color. 0 is black, 1 is white, 2 is yellow, 3 is blue, 4 is red, 5 is orange, 6 is purple, 7 is brown, 8 is green and 9 is pink. And the letters also have corresponding colors, both for the Latin alphabet (or whatever you call the one we use) and the Hebrew alphabet. It's been this way ever since I can remember, though I don't think I realized it until middle school.

So boroparkpyro told me I have something called synesthesia. The fact that it has a name and is a neurological "condition" makes it sound like some sort of flaw. Perhaps it is, but it also helps me remember numbers more easily.

Read the wikipedia entry. It's fascinating. There are other forms of synesthesia, such as personifying letters, or in some cases identifying sounds with taste.

Are any of you synesthetes?

Comments

[margavriel.livejournal.com]

Exodus 20:14:

יד וְכָל-הָעָם רֹאִים אֶת-הַקּוֹלֹת וְאֶת-הַלַּפִּידִם, וְאֵת קוֹל הַשֹּׁפָר, וְאֶת-הָהָר, עָשֵׁן; וַיַּרְא הָעָם וַיָּנֻעוּ, וַיַּעַמְדוּ מֵרָחֹק.

And all the people saw the qôlôth [thunders/sounds/voices], and the flashes, and the sound of the shôfor, and the mountain on smoke; and the people saw, and they trembled, and they stood far away.

(My favorite instance of religious synesthesia. This is what may happen in experiences that go beyond normal sensory perception, or at least merge what are normally separate senses.)

To quote the payyeton Shim`ôn bar Yitzhoq bar Ovun (Mahzôr for Shavu`oth, ed. J. Fränkel, p. 267):

וְכָל-הָעָם רֹאִים אֶת-הַנִּרְאֶה וְהַנִּשְׁמָע
וְשׁוֹמְעִים אֶת-הַנִּשְׁמָע וְאֶת-הַנִּרְאֶה
כְּשֶׁהַדִּבּוּר יוֹצֵא מִפִּי הַגְּבוּרָה / וְנֶחְצָב עַל-הַלֻּחוֹת בְּתִפְאָרָה
קוֹל קוֹלֵי קוֹלוֹת וְרוּחַ סְעָרָה / וְלַפִּיד לַפִּידֵי לַפִּידִים אֵשׁ בֹּעֵרָה
קוֹל יי בַּכֹּחַ וְקוֹל יי בַּהֲדָרָה / מְפָרֵשׁ אֶת-הַדִּבּוּר לְבָאֵרָה

And all the people were seeing both the visible and the audible,
And haring both the audible and the visible;
When the WORD went forth from the mouth of the Strong One, / and was engraved upon the tablets, gloriously,
Voice of voices of voices, and a stormy wind, / and the flash of flashes of flashes, a burning fire,
Voice of YHWH in mightiness, and voice of YHWH in beauty / was explaining the WORD, to make it clear.

[margavriel.livejournal.com]

Grr. In the second line of my translation of the poem, that should read "hearing", not "haring".

[alanscottevil.livejournal.com]

That's a beautiful piyyut.

[margavriel.livejournal.com]

Thanks. I copied and translated only the first five lines, out of 64. Thus, I have included only about 7.8%. Perhaps I shall transcribe and translate the entire thing as a post on my Blogspot blog.

[boroparkpyro.livejournal.com]

i agree, this piyut is amazing! will i find this in my Yekke makhzeiaurim? i don't remember who the editor is to know if it's the same edition or not.

[margavriel.livejournal.com]

It's the silluq for the Qerôvo ארח חיים מוסר תוכחת, which in many (most?) Ashkenazzi communities is recited on the SECOND day of `Shovu`ôs, but is printed in the Rödelheimer in the FIRST day's tefillôs (and thus is recited at KAJ).

In the bilingual Hebrew-English Rödelheimer which you own (translated by Jenny/Rivko Marmorstein, Basle, 1967), our silluq begins on p. 65, and runs through the middle of p. 67.

[rivka-m.livejournal.com]

woah-- that's beautiful. I'll have to remember this come parshat yitro. and shavuot.