Tuesday, January 30, 2007

Numbers are Colors

It's called color-graphemic synesthesia, and it's the most common type of synesthesia. I think my daughter has it. Lately she's been saying the strangest things. Yesterday she told me that February was her favorite month. I asked her if it was because of Valentine's day. She said no to that and told me that she likes February because it makes her think of the number 16, and she loves that number. I didn't ask her what color 16 is to her, because I didn't know she was associating months with numbers and colors...but it just seemed like one of her autistic-like behaviors so I went on and didn't think about it. Today she was doing her math and 750 was the answer. She was happy about that because apparently 750 is also one of her favorite numbers. She told me that it made her think of her favorite colors, blue and orange, and that they are complimentary. I think 50 is blue and 7 is orange. 16 is hot pink and so is February, naturally. I don't think I want to tell her that other people don't think of colors when they see numbers or hear the name of a month. I'll continue to investigate it covertly, without her realizing that she is different in some way, and I don't want her to start making things up for attention. That's not part of her personality though.

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