When I was little I would have these obsessive visuals that I was unable to control. (Of course, at the time, I didn’t refer to them as ‘obsessive visuals’, to me it was just something weird that happened and as much as I wanted it to stop, it wouldn’t.) Here is an example of one:
Every single time I was riding in a car, in my minds eye, there was a giant scythe that would mow down the entire landscape. Everything would go – trees, telephone poles, hills, until in my mind everything was flat. I remember thinking, why am I doing this? I wish it would stop. I remember thinking that maybe it would never stop. I don’t really remember when it did stop. I do know that it was gone when I started learning to drive. I remember thinking – hey! I’m not doing it anymore. Um. a giant scythe???
Later on I read about someone else that did this. I think. I might have dreamed that I read about it though, as I can’t remember where I read it. It might have been in Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.
Now that I’m thinking of it, I also had a hang up about slamming car doors. I absolutely refused to get out of the car if someone slammed the door while I was still inside and before I could open my side. I hated that vacuum sound/feeling it caused, and for some reason I protested this by locking the doors and not getting out /hiding in the car. It drove my mom crazy. “Get out of the car NOW!”
I tended to believe that almost everything had feelings.
So I would chew food an even number of bites and amounts on each side of my mouth, so that one side of my molars wouldn’t feel left out.
Our ice maker dispensed cubes that were usually connected in small groups. I could never break off some cubes and just leave one, because I thought it might get lonely.
I also had a tendency to over-think things. For example, if I was in the car and wanted the radio on, I wouldn’t ask my mom to turn it on…
If I ask her to turn on the radio, she will think about music.
If she thinks about music, she will think about the piano.
If she thinks about the piano, she will realize I haven’t practiced.
If she realizes I haven’t practiced, she will make me do so when we get home.
So turning on the car radio = a half-hour of torture by piano.
I know, I know… but there weren’t any nice kids to play with, so I had too much time to think.
Yes…I also believed that inanimate objects had feelings. Still do, kind of. If I walk around a store with something I pick up and walk around with for awhile, I feel bad putting it back on the shelf. Oh, the rejection it must feel. How lonely there on the shelf…
This is why the book “Skinny legs and All” - (Tom Robbins) appealed to me.
Can of Beans, Dirty Sock, Spoon…Where are they now?
I did the exact same thing except it was a straight razor not a scythe. As a child I thought it was odd and I couldn’t tell anyone or they would think I was crazy.
It never occured to me that someone else saw the same thing…
Count me in as one of the people who thought that inanimate objects have feelings (hell, I still think this at times, dunno why).
I also used to do what meow meow did and imagined that I was holding a large scythe and cutting down everything in its path as we went by (sometimes I thought of having a powerful laser beam instead).
I had a habit of counting in intervals of five. When driving and going past a series of utility poles I would count at a rate to ensure that every time I reached five we’d be passing by a pole.
I’d often think about what it would be like to be really small. I could hide in all kinds of places and explore areas I couldn’t go to at my present size. I also thought about what it would be like to be a giant and being able to step on all the kids I didn’t like, squashing them like bugs.
… okay, I confess, I kinda still do. If I’m eating jelly beans, I make sure that if I have three yellow ones in my hand, I find a fourth yellow one so that my mouth is properly balanced for jelly-bean colour per side. Symmetry dontcha know!
Never thought of the scythe thing, I did imagine horses jumping over everything though. Hedges, fences other cars…