Bonnie Lubinsky

I thought I was writing a message to one person. Sorry my "comment" reads more like a letter.

Hi Tom, I just discovered that aphantasia is a thing by reading the article in Nov.3rd's The New Yorker. (I am a bit behind in my reading.) The article fascinated me! Like you, I just assumed that visualizing was a figure of speech, or that it was something some people could do. I never thought I was in a small minority of people who could not do it. It never bothered me much. It still doesn't, but I am curious. I am not in total darkness when I close my eyes. If I want to visualize a beach, for example, it takes a while, but I can work up to a very vague yellow line with a faint yellow ball over it. I have to work hard at it to get that far. Again, if I try to see a tree, all I can come up with is a vaguely tree shaped, slightly lighter blob against the black background. Last night, I asked a friend if he could see a tree when he closed his eyes. He closed his eyes and described an oak tree with leaves around the trunk that had fallen. I was surprised at the details he could produce. And he does this kind of remembering of places often and looks for details in his visualizations. This is a very good friend who have known for 50 years, but this surprised me! We never talked about it. I am a musician, and I can hear music in my head. Sometimes it is quite unwelcome, an earworm, but more often than not it is pleasant. I can not hear harmony, though, just one line, the melody or otherwise. I can go back and forth between lines but not hear them together. I was really taken aback to read that people can hear whole orchestral scores in their heads. That's my story. I am so interested in asking more of my friends what they can see when they close their eyes! Best regards, Bonnie Lubinsky