My Diary place

Approaching Storm

I have synaesthesia which to me is when I get my senses get confused or I perceive one sense as another. Although 1 in 20 people have some form of this, my brother and sister have it but with one difference, it can overwhelm me. When I was little it was just way too much and kind of really scary, now it happens when there is too much sound or I am tired so need a little sleep. Swimming pools when the sounds bounce all over the place or markets such as those in Spain can be difficult. Seeing sounds is kind of normal but it has always been difficult. Although this might sound horrible it is kind of is part of me and I am not sure I would want it taken away from me. When I was little, I think we had about 50 different touches that told me thing, kind of only have about 20 now. So, for swimming (or in general) two taps near my eyes and one on my forehead is a question, meaning can you see? Then I can respond yes or no, if no it means do not let go of me (well mommy kind of knows that so she would not). Swimming is really tactical though so I am learning to use the touch of water to help and when I have my ears in the water it is really weird.

So how can I explain this to anyone, when I play the violin there are two things that come from the interaction of the bow with the strings. It has always been controlling the bow that has been the most difficult part for me. The first is vibration, most people do not separate this from the next, but this is a very tactile. I can feel it in my fingers and it travels through my body. Sadly, YouTube does not give me this but anyone playing near me means I can feel it. The other thing is changes in sound pressure; this is the part that deaf people cannot hear although they can feel the vibrations. While sound pressure comes from the bow interacting with the strings, the vibrations comes from fingers. This is why touch is so important to me but trust me the doppler effect is really beautiful. The changes in pressure are perceived by my ears but they look like fine sand or particles that emanate from the things that make them (they also bounce off walls). Low notes are slow, damp blue sounds that are very heavy. They drop and fall to the ground slowly. Whereas, high notes are red fast moving powerful light particles that have so much energy they bounce around a lot. The interaction can be quite magical because if you have the slow damp moving particles which is then followed more faster yellow or red particles they push through the blues and greens.

So, I have been trying to find something that explains what I see because it is just impossible to explain it as how I experience it. I have been trying for a way to explain it in a more visual way but I am not sure how to until I found this video. This video is based on John Hull expressions on becoming blind but explains it really well. The genus of putting John Hull perceptions into this video is just amazing. Even though I can see perfectly fine apart from a little loss on the left side but that is for another reason. I invite you to see what kind of I can hear. So, if you watch this on a computer you can use the mouse to look around or you can do it on your phone (I tested it on mommy

@AmalieAnne

Hey Ames xx

How u doing...

I'm still fighting flu been off work almost a week, but on the mend.

Just wanted to say hi

Hugs (germ free💜)

So I conducted a few interviews for this and I kind of wrote it weird narrative which I am hoping works. It is designed change quickly. Other than that, here we go...

Collapsing Reality in Confusion

As he lifted his head, a sort of smile came to his face, although not for long, as tears replaced the comfort that he wished. He looked up at the direction of the light that was blowing his clothing, making them seamlessly lift away from his body. A sharp impending thought entered my mind, something that for a long time, ever since I'd grown from baby to person, has always been there. This was my chance; maybe the only one I would ever have to make sure that he got what he really wanted. I took his chin into my hand, the light reflecting against his face, although not painfully or even directly so. That was just one of the things that happened, no one had ever told me or at least I'd never figured out why, when I was about to grant something, the light entered. It's only ever been something that has happened whilst I've known it has been my purpose in life to grant. A hand full of experiences is not much to discover who or what this was all truly about. However, its' always been known to me that the people I have chosen to grant, are in pain. Feeling that pain inside my heart, knowing that it's something that I could not stand to let happen, and knowing that I could always fix it. As I turned to stand directly in front of him, lowering my head in the process I spoke the words to him and hoped he would already know what was going to be whispered.

"It is time, the time to end this all. You're going to be changed." I tried to smile; however, the fear of what was about to happen hit me faster than I thought. I could feel his warm tears as they rolled down his face, coming into contact with my hand still touching and holding his chin.

"I am scared… what's happening...." He said as both his hands went to grip his stomach, as if he was in pain.

"Don't worry, it will be done soon." My voice started to break up as I ended the sentence. The pain was screaming throughout my body, lifting away from my heart to start with, and then entering the rest of me. It was almost like someone pouring melted wax onto your skin. At first the burning, along with the pain is the only feeling, but after that pain ceases, it leaves only the constricted, tightened essence. My hand on his chin became the lock for the transfer; I could feel my warm blood leaking from my arm and entering into his face. Although at this time I closed my eyes, as each passing moment transpired, it became more about being aware of feeling the room we were both in, rather than working from the data that my limited senses allowed me to feel. The transfer became more powerful and painful until the light became stronger to the extent it blocked everything out, including what I felt. The pain reached its completion and everything stopped, all that happened died down into a void.

****

I woke up shaking on the floor, most likely from the cold produced from the sweat-wet clothes that I had been wearing what looks like to be all night. My head was aching, although this was one of the features mornings often had to offer me. As I lifted my head from the resting place on the floor, I saw that my body had been curled up with unusual ability, almost in a childlike way. Abruptly the feeling from the rest of my body hit me, forcing my head back down to the former resting place on the blue carpet. Taken back from this, all I could really do was just stay there until either the energy or increasing need to move, made something happen. As I twisted my body around, so that I ended up lying on my back I remembered something. Being very unsure about whether it was just a dream or a fragment of some other memory that had somehow found its own way into my mind. Rather than being a sentence or something remotely touchable, it was just the warm feeling of something similar I had when I was younger. It was the feeling of the sun hitting my face, whilst I was in one of the many holiday villas I had spent time in as a child. Although somehow, with a great degree of difference, something irritated me about this single recollection. Something about it, did scare me, it was like a reflection of something familiar.

It was not until I touched my face, I realized the amount of blood that had come from somewhere. The need to move arose as I jumped up, and ran across to the mirror. I'd always been scared of my blood, especially losing blood and although it might sound really ludicrous, I never wanted anyone else to come into contact with it. I'd for the better part of my life been able to avoid blood tests, and had been careful to make sure that I would not cut myself in the process of doing anything. Always taking more time, and moving my body with precision. As I checked my face, arms and hands, I could not find the source of all the bleeding. I also thought it eerie that only my face had dried blood on it, nothing else, including the area of carpet that my head had been resting upon. I proceeded to walk quickly to the bathroom, making sure that no one else would accidentally see me in this state and presume wrong things. After washing my face, making sure that the face cloth and the sink had no evidence on them of whatever happen, I went back to my room to change. I thought to myself while changing the wet clothes that something was wrong. Like one of these feelings you've forgotten something, something bad that happened, although it had escaped your mind at this time for some reason. A justification of the depressed feelings you had impelling on your lungs. Only when you have noticed what it was, that had grown wings to fly away from your mind, were you able to reassure yourself it was not bad enough to feel so depressed about.

Placing my clothes in the laundry basket as I walked downstairs, the normal daily activities for a Saturday came to my mind. First of all, without any argument, it was time for coffee, but walking down the stairs more slowly than normally a thought appeared to me, that the blood might have in fact come from a nose bleed. Although that did not explain why I was sleeping on the floor, not on the bed and why it was that the blood was dry on my face, not anywhere else. I've always been one of those people concerned too much about the small details rather than anything else. However, ever since I remember it's been important to remember the small details, it's something that had to be done. Almost a responsibility of mine to make sure that what I call my gift is always used for what it should be used for. Every small detail is somehow related to it. Gift, that's a new way of mine of seeing my life through a more positive glass though most of the time I prefer to call it something worse. My 'gift' is a little hard to explain, without knowing what it feels like. It's almost like sensing peoples inner most desires and their strongest wills that are even mostly hidden from them but also drives them continuously. In general, most people are the same on the inside, they all want inner comfort and to be important to at least one person, to be loved as well. I don't mean those sorts of desires; I mean exactly what people want, whether it be fewer responsibilities, acceptance or to burst out in song in front of people.

Although in general, we are all the same, we are all very different in the one thing that we want. The scariest thing about my gift is that sometimes I can make it happen and people regret calling me freak for saying something stupid. I do not blame them for calling me a freak or weirdo, I think that I am but there is a self-acceptance to such a thing. As I walked into the kitchen I jumped back in alarm, one of my housemates has been already up. I wondered what the time was since I had not checked since I woke up on my bedroom floor, although I was quite assured that I knew what day it was, not losing it yet at least. Emily, one of the two people I shared a house with for the past four years, was just one of those lovely people you just happen to meet. Sweet as a cooking apple, intelligent to go far in life, but she had one really astounding quality; she was one of those naturally really great looking people. Even now with rubber gloves on, doing some washing up, she looked better than I could even if I tried for hours. Although I knew I would never end up marrying this beautiful woman, I made it my business to flirt and she made me feel really alive when I was around her. I wished that she would one day marry me, nonetheless it would never happen. It turned out we did not talk as much on this occasion, but she laughed, while turning back to look at her dirty dishes after I made my rather jumpy entrance. Walking across the kitchen I made one of my comments.

"You know, you really do look good in those gloves. You really should do the washing up more often; I think it would be good for both of us!" Turning on the kettle as I finished talking, then moving to stand behind her whilst she made circle moments with a dish cloth.

"Don't be cheeky Andrew; it's too early to beat you up!" Not even lifting her head up.

I walked closer to her, and kissed her on the top of her head. Her hair smelt sweet like it always does, even though I was not really sure of what it smelt of on this occasion. I said softly but playfully, "Don't worry, you can buy one of those new dishwashers so you can concentrate your efforts on cleaning my underpants. I know that's what you really want to do with your days off." She giggled, and then turned around to threaten me with the dishcloth.

"Hey, put the dish cloth down and step away from the sink. We can sort this out, just don't do anything you'll regret later on", as I started to laugh at my own predictable comments.

She put the dish cloth down, and stepped a little closer to me. Her face turned from a smile to an almost tearful, painful expression I'd only ever seen a few times in her. In the last attempt to cheer her up something bluntly came out, "don't worry, I will get someone else to clean my underpants if you want?"

"Its' not that although no, do your own laundry, I am going to see the dentist on Monday about my teeth. I am so conscious about them; I really do want him to do something about how they look." Stepping closer towards me, so my arms automatically enclosed her into a hug.

"What do you mean your teeth?" Almost shocked since she was perfect in every way possible.

"They're just so straight, and they look horrible!" Her eyes filling with tears, as she looked at me. I could feel something was really wrong, actually I thought that this might all be a dream or a joke that she was playing with me. Still, it was not that, I felt her pain and of course, my stupid 'gift' was confusing with what I knew to be true. Emily had been born with the most perfect set of teeth known to humankind; I did not know why she was so upset. I must have murmured something else to her, along the lines of that I would support her, but to be honest, I was just so confused that I did not know what to say. Very much unlike me, I normally know what to say and how to say it.

****

The weekend passed quickly, although I must say it was not like any other, I had been through. Little things kept playing on my mind, maybe it was just Emily and what she said about her teeth playing at the back of my mind all the time. I don't know, it was certainly something and everyone seemed to be different in some way. I only thought about what I had woken up to on Saturday morning a couple of times, still like with everything else there was a piece missing. It just so happens that the piece of information missing was the piece that linked what I knew with what I did not know, frustrating as well as silently scary. Monday morning came like every other Monday morning, I think most people walk around in shock not expecting it to come, well I know that I do at least. If I am going to be late, it's normally this day of the week and quite like normal Emily was already up, ready to go when I rushed downstairs, tie around my neck waiting to be done. "Sorry, running late." I said as she lodged a piece of toast in my mouth, another reason this woman is great I thought to myself.

"Tell me when you're not! That way you'll save on words bunny just dont sleep on the carpet again. Come on, let's go." She said walking towards the front door. "Bye Jane, " she shouted out, Jane our other housemate shouted something back, but I did not hear it. Jane sort of likes to keep herself to herself, and it was not like we'd ever been that close to each other. Emily was wearing her light brown hair up today, the way that I loved it. Well, if the general impression is that I love everything about this woman, then it's rightly placed. We did not share a bed, or even a room, but we had been going out in a sort of way, for the last few months but friends since 1965 so a few years. Maybe she was using me until she found someone much better, or just waiting for me to move on the whole relationship question, maybe ask her to marry me. Still, I did not want to rush things; I was so scared of losing what I already had with her. I often joked with myself that if only my gift was to mind read it would be so much better for me; at least I would gain something from it then. Don't get me wrong, I'd always gotten a lot out of changing people's lives, helping them, but it was that, well, I would never benefit from it, I don't see how I could.

As I followed Emily to the car, she repeated what she had said on Saturday morning, something which in my already confused state I did not want to hear. "I am going to the dentists today, to ask about my teeth". She said as if it was a statement, although I could tell it was more like a question and a want for approval.

"Ok, well please just talk to him about stuff and then we can talk about it together tonight, before you get anything done." She seemed quite happy with that, and got into the drivers' side of the car. I think that she did not trust me to drive when I was running late, something to do with almost running over a cat about a year before. I was in a rush, and was not paying that much attention I do admit. Still, I did not hurt the cat in any way.

As we, or Emily shall I say drove to work I looked across the car to see the church that so often reminded me of how all this started. I was about 20 or so, when I first used my gift to change someone else's life. Before that I had always known inside me there was something that I could do. It was a cold winter's day and for the first time I walked into that church for some irrational reason, which is still unknown to me. I saw this man that could not find a job, he was poor as hell, maybe a word I should not use in conjunction with a church. Anyway, I felt his pain when I walked into that church, I felt the disappointment in himself failing to provide, as he saw it, for his wife and two daughters. I just knew all this without even knowing him or even uttering a word to him. As I walked to the front of the church, he turned and looked at me with an almost terrified look on his face. What happened next is not really that believable and is harder to explain. It was almost like everything around us became air, the other people failed to even notice us and what happened afterwards. I was driven by some God, and as I placed my hand on his head the church started to get brighter and my heart started beating a million times faster. My whole body started hurting, as I tried to lift my hand away from his head, I could not, it hurt more and my arm was no longer controlled by me.

I closed my eyes for a second, and for a while it felt like I became everything in the world. I could feel the wind, the sun, light, darkness, it was overwhelming. Then the light got so bright I could not see anything, almost at the same point I started to panic as I thought that my hand was bleeding. I'd always been scared of bleeding, and it was made worse by not being able to move or even see my hand. After what felt like a good ten minutes, although most likely a few seconds, everything went back to normal. Then I removed my hand from the man's head, and he said thank you. I was almost in tears, and ran out of the church, to head home. I thought that I had gone crazy; I'd only just decided to graduate in three more years to become a psychotherapist, which maybe should have given me an insight. After that experience it only had happened three more times, at least I thought that it had. I am unsure for some reason, most likely nothing but a random feeling though.

I almost snapped out of that memory, when Emily pulled into the car park of the hospital that we both worked in. She was the up and flying psychiatrist and I was the psychotherapist, who almost no one wanted to listen since I was not experienced enough to change the system. One thing I learnt from the department of mental illness in this hospital is that most of the people paid to help others, are often in need of a lot of help themselves. I know that I do, so many times I thought that I was crazy or having some weird manic delusions about my whole gift thing. Or maybe it was just comfortable to sit behind a mental health problem, either way I always kept this to myself. That man in the church, my first time of granting, I later read in the paper he came up with an invention that made him millions, no doubt he moved up in the world. I am glad for him, although maybe he could have shared the wealth since I get paid much less than Emily for doing more work!

When I stepped out of the car, I felt like someone had hit me a full-blown smack in the stomach. I saw three of my work colleagues wearing really stupid clothing; they looked somewhat out of the future. One person, Lisa, the general manager of red tape, as I call it, for our department was wearing no make-up. I don't mean that to sound rude, but with her fancy-dress outfit and her normal heavy applied make-up missing, it did somewhat shock me. I started to laugh to myself as she walked into the main building entrance, to which Emily had already walked through herself stopping and giving me a most weird look, like I had committed an act of a crazy man. "What is it?" She snapped at me.

"Did you notice anything about Lisa today? Anything unusual at all?" I admit I expected her to agree with the direction of my thoughts.
Emily continued to walk through the main entrance without answering, with me closely following behind her, quite not seeming to ever catch up at any point. I spent the morning trying to hide anyway, and at lunch time I went to Emily's office, located three rooms away from mine on the left. She had her door open like it normally is, so I just walked in, but unlike normal as soon as I stepped close to her desk, I looked at her client list for that day. Thankfully, I was not on it, although I half expected myself to be. There was something wrong with either myself or everyone else, it had not appeared until now. There were too many weird things going on like people had forgotten what it was like to be… well normal. Rather than making an effort towards this standard, they were all trying to move away from it. This is too crazy; I think that I've gone mad!

****

It was now the end of the day; Emily had already gone home since she left early to see the dentist. This had been one of the weirdest days that I've been through in a long time. It hit 5:30pm and I really wanted to make my way out of the hospital, to start on my not so long walk home. However, everyone seemed to be trying to stop me, first of all one of the nurses from the ward kept asking me to stay although she would not tell me why. She kept saying that it was better for me to stay here for a while, might be because of a surprise party held in my honour. Still, it was not my birthday and I had not done anything worthy of a party for, well in a long time. I sort of had to rudely push past her to get out, only to be almost shouted at by Lisa, who was sitting at the reception at the end of the ward. I rushed past her saying something like; sorry I am in a real rush and have to get home. I don't know what it was with these people today. I got to the hospital main entrance, walking out while doing up my long black coat. It always keeps me warm on cold winter days like today, I love this coat. Walking in the direction of home, I noticed how dark it was and it was getting colder along with it.

As I walked down the path, I felt something hit me in the stomach, and something else was holding me back. I could see nothing stopping me, but for some reason, I could not move without applying a large amount of force to my movements. It was like walking in water, you always have to be much slower and find difficulty in moving. A single flash of blue light hit my eyes, as the pain from my stomach made me head-towards the floor, my hands softening my landing although only to a small extent. As my face hit the ground, an explosion of thought happened in my head. I remembered what I did, what happened on Friday night. I know why I had dried blood on my face, why it was that I woke up on the carpet and why Emily and everyone else had changed. This was the first time I had ever noticed that along with everyone else I actually had a single desire. It would make sense that, since I had a gift & the desire for that one special thing that these two would come together in union at some point. Still, it's more than just making sense, I remember it happening, I remember being both the person receiving the gift and the one granting the gift. I had been two different people at the same time, and had granted myself my one desire. But rather than it working, something had gone wrong. Maybe it was that I could never grant myself, it could have been one of the rules of this game. I woke up with blood on my face, since when I was granting my hand, which was holding my own chin, blood had poured out of my hand onto his, rather my face. The light could have dried the blood.

In the normal process of granting the person's life is changed for the better. On this occasion what had happened is that rather than me being changed everyone else in the world had, slowly, started to change instead. This explains the crazy comments that Emily made about her teeth being nice and straight. It also explained why the people around me, Lisa for example, looked so very different. I had single-handedly changed the worlds perception. I said out loud: "what have I done?" I knew this, even now resting on the floor in pain, that this was all wrong. I got an abrupt hit of more pain....

****

"Hello Andrew, my name is Doctor Freehold; I am one of the psychiatrists. Although I don't normally work in the same ward that you're in." She looked at Andrew, a man of 23 years old who had a very strong form of psychosis. Doctor Freehold herself an experienced doctor had been working part time after an unsuccessful retirement and now aged in her 70s took more interest in unusual cases.

She continued, "Do you remember last night at all? You broke out of ward 11 and then decided to break into my office on ward 10. You then went through my medical books, and wrote a very interesting story on my wall in black ink. I am very interested in how much you believe in your fairy-tale, about someone called Emily and a thing you called your gift. Is that Emily me, Andrew? I don't believe we have met before, have we?" He looked down after looking directly at her and did not attempt to answer her at all.

So, she went on, "You tried to walk out, but when one of the nurses found you, you pushed passed her. She followed you outside while someone else called the police. In the end they accidentally knocked you out, because you completely ignored them and tried to continue away from the hospital. I hope that you understand that, someone in your condition, we could not simply let you go. You'd end up hurting yourself and maybe even other people. Andrew, do you understand? ... Andrew...."

After a couple of minutes of silence, a nurse walked in, and whispered something in my ear. "Emily, we found a large amount of Andrews's medication hidden under his bed. He has not been taking it, we can only presume." Luckily Andrew did not even notice the nurse coming into the room; he just seemed to be staring out of the window at this point. It was a cold November day. For some reason Emily thought back to her honeymoon with her husband, part of the reason she did not completely retire was because he died in 1988. She turned her attention back to Andrew, and thought to herself that I had actually seen him somewhere else. I have not seen him as a doctor in this hospital, somewhere else possibly. A cold shiver went down her back. Just then Andrew turned and said something to me. "I have a gift; I can read peoples minds. Sometimes I can even live their memories for a short while. In an odd kind of way that is." He said, turning back around to stare out the window when he had finished talking.

"Andrew, it's very wrong to think that." Emily said. Then, with horror she realized that once her soon to be husband whose office is three doors down and to the right from hers, had said something about waking up on the floor a couple of years ago, in what is now his old room. She also realized that on Monday mornings, her soon to be husband would always be running late, she always would drive to work. Since he about a year before that and a half ago had almost run over a cat. She didn't trust him to drive when he was running late. She then realized with shock that this 23-year-old had written her memories on her own office walls.

Andrew then turned and smiled. He started to talk I have missed you; my one desire was always to be with you and I have. As tears replaced the comfort that he wished he went on, It is time Emily For some reason Emily knew what he was saying and knew that he had come back. A light started to blow their clothing, making them seamlessly lift away from their bodies. Andrew continued " You're not going to be changed but don't be scared." He tried to smile; however, the fear of what was about to happen hit him faster than he thought. He could feel his warm tears as they rolled down his face. Both of them knew they was no need to be scared or even ask what was happening. Emily softy said Thank you for not making me go through this alone

At this time, they closed their eyes, as each passing moment transpired, it became more about being aware of feeling the room we were both in, rather than working from the data that my limited senses allowed them to feel. The transfer became more powerful and painful until the light became stronger to the extent it blocked everything out including what they felt. The pain reached its completion and everything stopped, all that happened died down into a void.

****

After around 20 minutes both Andrew, age 23 and Emily aged 73 were both found dead with blood around their faces, dried with no real reason of how it got there. No real explanation of how they had died could be found. They both look content and happy almost embracing each other, as if they knew each other.

Summer Holiday/vacation playlist – it is not very long but kind of thought these are few of the really good ones.

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?listLeYqO16rIKaVNIrAnvF-7sxzWeNX2d6r3

1. Cinderella (2015) - "The Great Secret" by Patrick Doyle
2. Surfing Dolphins –

A few Holiday Pictures (2019)

What happens when you are a little sick and kind of grumpy. You do this of course: