Synesthesia

I’ve been working with my friend on how to put into words what it is like having synesthesia. Being a projector synesthete, it is oddly easier for me to animate it. I’m finding it really really difficult to put into words, but look at me now … attempting to put into words what it is like … the way I know how. Maestro … I’m now in month 15 since being diagnosed. I spent the first six months angry, then three motivated, then three angry again, and the last three building out a series of products that could help me lead a better life. See, I have a lot of different types of synesthesia, so it makes my overall “processing” very very sensitive. (I’m speaking in vague terms until I can talk about it more openly but) Due to such sensitivity, I got pretty pissed at what was available on the market. I paid almost $50 for what Amazon called “sensory lenses” only to laugh my ass off at how horrifically cheap they were. .50 cent glasses marked up to $50 really riled up my autistic sense of injustice. Focused on myself first, I then bought a pair of my own frames (this time Tom Ford), and took them to the eye doctor next to my favorite watering hole. I didn’t know that that one tiny product preference would actually change the direction of my career. My friends (who are mostly neurodivergent) then asked about the glasses I was wearing, and without skipping a beat I would comment saying “these aren’t sunglasses, these are my sensory glasses. They help me feel less ‘buzzy.’” That then opened up the conversation to what sensory lenses are, and they wanted to try them on. They’ve even been worn by a dog (but solely for likes on the Gram). The result has been months of (truly astounding) research and development. I’ve been buying up as many “on-the-market” glasses I could find (while out and about and with intention) and as I kept A/B testing, the frames that I made kept having more of an impact. I’m still in R&D, but BECAUSE I have synesthesia, I can easily recognize when I am onto something … and I KNOW I am onto something. While my spidey senses may be tingling at a very high rate, because of these lenses, I have had a lot more energy around people and thus have been the most social I have been since … even before COVID. My friends say my face is a lot more animated, and shockingly, people want to hang out a lot more. Or, maybe now that I know I’m autistic, they are just asking more directly (or maybe I am starting to speak neurotypical) … Either way, last Saturday, Jeff and I set the intention to buy our friend a birthday gift. I suggested (for no particular reason at the time) going to the Fairfax above Beverly area. It’s become a really cool “scene” for