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The Fine Art of Whispering to yourself

I probably wouldn’t have noticed an old man sitting on a bench on the seawall in the shadow of a tree, but I’d stopped to pick up an interesting pebble on the shore and I felt him staring at me -or, more likely, through me. There are places where you can walk among the rocks when the tide is out but few people venture off the safety of the seawall; if they even notice me, they sometimes only stop and point. Or stare, like Jamie was doing.

I waved to show I saw him, and then shrugged when he didn’t respond. A stare from him is like that sometimes. “I’m wrapped in my mind, G,” he would reply irritably if I ever tried to unwrap him. “Inspiration,” he would explain if pushed. “I’m waiting for inspiration…” and then, after his feeble attempt at verbal ellipses, would disappear somewhere inside a room in his head and the door to it would close once again. Apparently his Muse lives in an adjacent room, but sleeps a lot -or so Jamie seems to think. I’m not sure what he does while he waits for it to wake up, though; he never goes into that kind of detail. What he did confide to me after I’d plied him with questions, however, was that what he was waiting for was an idea to strike him -something so jarring and unusual that it would be like fireworks going off in his head.

That intrigued me, of course; I suppose we’ve all experienced thoughts like that, but for most of us, they are rare and seldom lead to any actionable results. At any rate, ever since he started to attend our Wednesday morning coffee meetings at the Food Court, he’s talked about these episodes -especially if he’d had one recently. He usually broke into our aimless bantering with a question for us. Something profound, or at least, abstruse. I mean we’re all old men, eh? We don’t go around looking for cracks in our knowledge, or novel interpretations of things most of us have never heard of anyway. Aphantasia was his most recent illumination.

It was a poor turnout this Wednesday. Only Joel, a spa salesman, and Jamie were there.

Joel rolled his eyes -it’s a spa-thing I suppose. “And just what is aphantasia, Jamie?”

Jamie sighed, as if he realized he’d have to humour him as usual. “It means you can’t form a mental image of something unless you are actually seeing it.”

It took Joel a moment to think of the ramifications of that. “So I couldn’t think of an apple if I’m not holding one?”

“Couldn’t visualize an apple in your head,” Jamie replied, then took a few moments to think about it. “I mean you could probably think about an apple, I guess; you just couldn’t form a mental image of it…” He didn’t sound as if he was absolutely sure about an aphantasiac’s ability to think about something.

Joel looked confused. “Uhmm… Why is aphantasia the topic of the day, Jamie?”

A wicked smile gradually surfaced on Jamie’s face. “Remember what G was telling us last week about the witch he used to date?” Joel nodded, only mildly interested in what that had to do with anything. “And remember he said that she dreamed in textures, or colours -no images, just feelings or sensations?”

Another nod from Joel -well, actually he’d spilled some coffee on his doughnut, and was trying to wipe it off, so I’m not sure just how much attention he was doling out to Jamie.

“Well, guess what aphantasiacs do?”

Joel shrugged, as he wiped off the last bit of coffee from the icing of his doughnut.

I was more interested in the answer than Joel, evidently, but I had more skin in the game, I guess. “So, are you going to tell us, Jamie?” I finally asked after waiting for him to volunteer the answer. To tell the truth, except for my ill-considered confession at the coffee gathering last Wednesday, I hadn’t given my witch story much serious thought for years. She had merely been a youthful adventure and as the years piled up in my life, so did the adventures. There had been an elderly pause in the conversation last week, and being uncomfortable in the silence, I’d confessed about the witch; I might have exaggerated a bit for effect, but like Jamie, I fancy myself a writer and allow myself authorial liberties -like his current pause to heighten the dramatic effect, I suppose.

His eyes narrowed, a sure sign that his Muse had stirred to life. “Aphantasiacs dream like that, G. It suddenly occurred to me that your witch would make a great story.” He had a tentative sip of his coffee and tried to wrestle with my eyes.

“And how would you approach it?” I asked, careful he didn’t think I was going to steal any ideas.

He studied my expression, and then, still uncertain how much he should divulge, shrugged. “Well, I haven’t decided whether or not she kills you as a feeling of anger sweeps over her in one of her dreams.

Joel’s face seemed to brighten as he listened. “Don’t you think that’s a bit harsh, J? I mean G said she was a good witch, eh?”

Jamie hardened his face and his body stiffened reflexively. “It’s just a story, Joel. And anyway I was only playing with interesting scenarios…” I could tell he was wondering what a spa salesman could possibly know about drama.

Unfazed, Joel turned his eyes on me. “What do you think he should do with it, G?”

I smiled and pretended to shrug. “I’d let him develop it further and then, when he’s happy with it, give us an outline of the plot…” I glanced at Jamie and could see he didn’t seem to object.

“How would you write it, G?” Joel persisted. “I mean it’s your witch, eh?”

The witch and her history had bubbled away like a cauldron in an seldom-visited region of my mental garden for years, I suppose. I would dip a ladle in it every so often, but in truth there were so many other pots simmering out there, any sampling was random. Other episodes of my life melded together quietly and I often had no idea the sources from which I was drawing. It’s not always a sudden flash of insight that goads an idea; it’s more often a quiet thought that occurs to me on a walk, or maybe an old man sitting on a bench, staring at me from the seawall that inspires ideas that gradually coalesce.

I looked up from the partly eaten bagel on my plate and smiled as I shook my head. “It’s Jamie’s idea now, Joel.”

I didn’t have the heart to admit I’d already written a story and several essays about my witch. And besides, maybe Jamie’s retelling of it would provide more fodder for me…

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