Many, many moons ago I went on a trip to New York and my friend Laney was there at the same time visiting her childhood friend, Anthony. We were all hanging out and Laney realized that both Anthony and I shared an uncommon trait. We both associate numbers with colors.

My mind was totally blown by this. I’d never met anyone who sees numbers that way; I’d literally thought I was the only one on earth. And I didn’t tell many people so the fact that Laney knew someone else who does the same thing seemed so crazy.

Turns out it even has a name! I know, right? It’s a form of synesthesia.

The thing that ultimately ended up throwing Laney for a loop was: Anthony and I didn’t have the same colors for the same numbers. For example, I’d see 2,3,4 as yellow, green, blue respectively. However, Anthony might see 2, 3, 4 as orange, blue, red respectively.  She had instantly accepted that both of us made the associations but hadn’t factored in that the associations would be different.

I hadn’t thought about this in years until recently when someone pointed out that another “thing” I do actually is a thing. Pareidolia is seeing faces in inanimate objects.  I thought it was just a quirk, albeit an adorable quirk, but quirk, nonetheless. But no. People study this. People named this. Most importantly, other people DO this.

Crazy, right?

So I started wondering what else other people do that I thought I was the only one doing it. And thanks to the handy, dandy internet, I found a few. Thought I’d share some that I found that I relate to just for fun.

• Apologizing to doors and furniture when you bump into it.
• Feeling guilty that you’re not helping when a repair guy is fixing something in your house.
• Walking in circles around your home whenever you’re on the phone.
• On a road trip, you start to think of the other cars as your travel companions and feel a tinge of sadness when you exit the highway.
• Getting lost in thought while reading, but don’t notice until you’re three pages past where you stopped paying attention.
• Smiling at dogs when they walk past without acknowledging their owners.
• Having a mini panic attack trying to get your change in your wallet before it’s the next guy’s turn to check out.
• Spelling out Wednesday like Wed-nes-day in your head when you’re writing it. Also Feb-ru-ary.
• Feeling sympathy for inanimate objects when they’re underused or discarded.
• Rehearsing arguments in your head, just in case it should ever come up.
• Getting nervous about making small talk with hairdressers.
• Wiping your cell phone screen to make all the smudge marks go in the same direction.
• Sometimes talking to people as if they already had the context of what was going on inside your head.
• Forgetting someone’s name right after they’ve introduced themselves.
• Rehearsing whatever stories you would tell as a guest on a late-night talk show.
• Staging fictional conversations between you and friends, enemies, celebrity crushes, anyone.
• Ripping a bit of skin from your lip, but it turns out to be a really big bit and you’re like shouldn’t have done that.
• Putting rolled up toilet paper in your nostrils when you have a cold.
• Trying to make mini salads on your fork when eating a salad (a little lettuce, some tomato, some cheese, etc.).
• Holding your breath in an underwater scene in a movie or tv show to see if you would survive.
• Not believing the person who you just asked if they have the remote and demanding them to stand up.
• Doing something you were embarrassed about and look to make sure no one saw and then immediately tell your friend about it.
• And so many more!

If you’re ever feeling all alone, like no one could possibly understand what you’re going through, check the internet. 😉

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