Is it LSD or Just Me?

The first I heard of synesthesia was in a writing prompt included in a standardized test (Massachusetts Comprehensive Academic Something or Other test, to be precise). The admittedly dry and poorly written blurb spoke of a mysterious a neurologically based phenomenon. It results when a few neurons are crossed in one's brain, causing some funky stuff to happen. People with synesthesia may assign tastes to numbers, colors to letters, and visual images to sound. Sounds crazy, but its a well documented occurence. In order to better understand this "disorder" (in quotes because its more of a superpower anyways) I've taken the liberty of interviewing a man with synesthesia. His name is Sam.

ME: Hello Sam. Thanks for agreeing to do this.

SAM: Yeah, no problem. (Sam's pretty cool)

ME: So, synesthesia right? Can you explain what its like?

SAM: Do you know how in iTunes you can turn on the visualizer?

ME: Yeah...

SAM: Its nothing like that. Basically sounds manifest themselves as sight.

ME: Doesn't that get in the way of seeing things, like, if you're listening to a particularly rocking guitar solo in the car, do the note-splosions get in the way?

SAM: Note-splosions?

ME: Yeah, its the scientific term. Or whatever.

SAM: Actually it doesn't really work like that. Its more like I have a sixth sense; seeing sound is the best way I can describe it to a muggle like you.

ME: Did you just call me a muggle?

SAM: Don't worry about it

ME: Ok! So, whats the best looking sound you've ever heard?

SAM: That would be Samuel L. Jackson reading the new testament

ME: What? Are you serious?

SAM: No not at all. I just get really sick of interviewers asking that question. I told the lady from Readers Digest the best looking sound was the Tie Fighter noise from Star Wars.

ME: Oh Sam, you are quite the kidder. Everyone knows that sound is just a baby elephant squeal played in tandem with a car on pavement. (Totally true).

SAM: You know the sound of you casually dropping random facts to let everyone know how smart you are, looks black as death.

ME: Ha, like I said quite the kidder.

I'm aware this post wasn't the most informative of entries, but if your curiosity is piqued, you may want to check the wikipedia page (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synesthesia). It does a much better job of explaining than either me or Synesthesia Sam could do.