Maroon-y

Being a synesthete is sort of like being Superman.

Except not at all.

It’s sort of like being trapped in your own skin when you neurons are screaming to be free of their chains, to be released from the crusty tendrils of old notions that others have of you.

It’s a responsibility. To be better than people who don’t understand. To blend in so that those people don’t feel threatened or belittled. To be there for younger synesthetes who are just beginning to learn the significance of their difference.

It’s a privilege, to know and to see what other people don’t see.

It’s a curse, to know and to see what other people don’t see.

Synesthesia is not a disease. It is not a problem. It is not something that prevents you from living your life, but prevents others from living in yours.

It is everything and nothing, so important and so disastrously useless.

But being a synesthete is more than synesthesia. It is the knowledge that you have something others want and others fear. It’s that rumbling ache from the soles of your shoes to the soul of your soul when you see another synesthete, one who is not comfortable in their freaky, colorful skin, one who is crying out to be understood and you just want to shout I GET YOU. I GET YOU, AND NOBODY ELSE DOES, AND SOMEHOW WE WILL BE OKAY.

But you can’t, because it’s all a secret, because the mere mortals will never just let it be okay.