Life gets pretty complicated as Mia navigates endless questions at school as well as struggles to balance between her school friends and the people she's meeting through her new synesthesia networks. On the downside, though, Mia's best friend, Jenna, let's her secret slip and now everyone at school knows about her condition. Even better, she meets other people just like her and she finally feels like less of a freak. Ah, so that's what's been going on for Mia all these years. Her parents take her to a slew of doctors, and before long, they figure out that Mia has a rare condition called synesthesia. Rising Action One of These Things Is Not Like the OtherĪfter failing a couple of math tests, Mia finally fesses up to her parents about numbers having colors. And hiding it is a big part of Mia's problem in this book. Without her experience of being mocked for synesthesia as a kid, she wouldn't try to hide it quite so much. Even though we don't get to know Mia as a third grader, we'll call this peak into her past our exposition because it sets us up for the rest of the novel. She doesn't think too much of this, though, until her classmates laugh at her one day because of it. It's fascinating to try and see each other's way of seeing the world.Mia is your average school kid, expect for the fact that she sees colors whenever she hears sounds or reads. Some people don't have an inner monologue, but I'm sure they have other capabilities. I love that my son hears most Red Hot Chili Peppers' tracks as orange. Others have synaesthesia and see music as colours. Another listener had sense of smell that came in taste - she could actually sniff ingredients and know what will be delicious or disgusting before even heating up a pan. In a short paragraph, email us your pitch: Philippa thinks of a friend, the spelling of their name comes up in their brain. Chances are there's others facing the same highs, lows and life experiences. As a child, she couldn't add three and seven because three is so devious it didn't feel right for it to hold hands and join up with lovely, gentle seven.ĪBC Everyday's Perspectives is all about giving you a chance to share what you're going through. Jenny sees numbers as little cartoon characters - some are evil and some are good. Some had aphantasia and one young girl Georgia even had my over-feeling. When I confessed my deficit on my ABC Radio Sydney Morning show some listeners had their own "aha" moment. I can literally feel the new pins and plates in my leg. Last week I dislocated and broke my ankle - just writing this makes me feel the moment all over again. If you tell me you've broken a finger, I have to put my finger under my armpit to stop it hurting. I think I've developed other powers to compensate. Trying to conjure up mind images reminded me of being a kid and trying to move a pencil with my mind like Matilda used chalk to terrorise Miss Trunchbull. I've developed other powers to compensateĪt the Future Minds Lab at UNSW I recently became a lab rat for studies on aphantasia. These are highly emotional memories for me, but they don't come as visual flashbacks. Now my mother understands why I can't remember a lot of my childhood - just deeply felt thoughts of white ABBA boots, a brown crochet bikini and a highly embarrassing moment when a man rescued me in the deep end of the local pool when he thought I was drowning and I thought I was doing butterfly. Now my friends understand why I'm hopeless at remembering faces of people I have met once or twice. Now my partner knows why I can't imagine how furniture we see online will look in the house. When I discovered this was unusual, I found out that I had a condition called aphantasia and, when I came out to my friends and family, the pennies dropped big time. No visual memories, just deeply felt thoughts When asked to visualise things, any things, I get nothing. It's oranges, bananas, buildings, people, dogs, beaches.
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