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1:33am February 23, 2012
When I was young and had neither found out that words are supposed to be thoughts nor worked out how to make the connection, I had an entirely different way I communicated things. Very few people picked up on it, but for some reason I persisted. The technique had to do with the arrangement of objects, in both space and time, and the way I interacted with them. It could be sticks, little ceramic figurines, books, cloth with a certain texture/color/pattern, music, trees, rocks, pictures, pretty much anything. The key was in the pattern they formed both with each other and with me. If someone looked at the pattern in exactly the right way, they could see who I was. Because most of the ways I communicate without words just plain don’t convey the same sort of things words do. When I call things like this my native language, I mean that they are forms of communication that come as natural to me as language does to most people. I’m comfortable with them. And part of the reason for that is that by their nature they exist outside language and are therefore easier for me. People sometimes ask me crap like “well when you wiggle your right hand about and whoosh it past your face, what’s the translation for that?” There is no translation between symbolic things like language, and things that exist outside of that realm. And the nature of the communication is often geared towards entirely different goals than language is geared towards. But if I were forced to translate this communication anyway, it might run something like this: I am here. Right here. Right exactly here. And this is how I am shaped. Can you see these shapes beneath the surface? Do you see me at all? Because I’m here. Exactly here. And I exist. And you exist too. Do you want to exist near me? I would love for that to happen. Existing is good. Existing right in this shape, in this place. You can experience the things I am arranging, and that will lead you closer to me and hopefully to them as well. I would love to meet you too, can you show me through things who you are and where you are? That’s in many ways a horrible translation that takes the depth out of the experience. But it’ll have to do. Until recent years only one person ever really worked out the patterns. And that was good and dismaying. Good because at last one person worked things out, and bad because it was only one. And the only other person I know that understood me when I did that stuff is feliscorvus. So that makes two. Anyway that’s just the backstory so as not to be confusing. The real thing I wanted to talk about is that in the past few days I’ve randomly come across several people’s tumblr that reassure people that they’re not just pictures. (Often accompanied by complaining about picture blogs. I think I saw the word meaningless twice.) And that surprised me. Obviously I don’t care if another person’s tumblr is pictures or words or both, nor what they think of picture-only tumblrs. That’s their business not mine. But I found it interesting that so many people thought this. Because I love pictures on tumblr. Because they serve exactly the same function that arranging objects does: If you look at the pictures I reblog, and you do it just right, you can see important things about me. It’s possible to see me through my words too but it’s much harder. I’m far from a picture thinker, but closer to that than a word thinker. And tumblr pictures will do nicely to convey things. In some ways, it feels like my writing gives access to my mind, but arranging pictures shows my feelings and other deeper aspects of things I have no word for. My soul, maybe? And yes, even banana slugs and slime molds have their place there. :-P

When I was young and had neither found out that words are supposed to be thoughts nor worked out how to make the connection, I had an entirely different way I communicated things. Very few people picked up on it, but for some reason I persisted.

The technique had to do with the arrangement of objects, in both space and time, and the way I interacted with them. It could be sticks, little ceramic figurines, books, cloth with a certain texture/color/pattern, music, trees, rocks, pictures, pretty much anything. The key was in the pattern they formed both with each other and with me. If someone looked at the pattern in exactly the right way, they could see who I was.

Because most of the ways I communicate without words just plain don’t convey the same sort of things words do. When I call things like this my native language, I mean that they are forms of communication that come as natural to me as language does to most people. I’m comfortable with them. And part of the reason for that is that by their nature they exist outside language and are therefore easier for me. People sometimes ask me crap like “well when you wiggle your right hand about and whoosh it past your face, what’s the translation for that?” There is no translation between symbolic things like language, and things that exist outside of that realm. And the nature of the communication is often geared towards entirely different goals than language is geared towards.

But if I were forced to translate this communication anyway, it might run something like this:

I am here. Right here. Right exactly here. And this is how I am shaped. Can you see these shapes beneath the surface? Do you see me at all? Because I’m here. Exactly here. And I exist. And you exist too. Do you want to exist near me? I would love for that to happen. Existing is good. Existing right in this shape, in this place. You can experience the things I am arranging, and that will lead you closer to me and hopefully to them as well. I would love to meet you too, can you show me through things who you are and where you are?

That’s in many ways a horrible translation that takes the depth out of the experience. But it’ll have to do. Until recent years only one person ever really worked out the patterns. And that was good and dismaying. Good because at last one person worked things out, and bad because it was only one. And the only other person I know that understood me when I did that stuff is feliscorvus. So that makes two.

Anyway that’s just the backstory so as not to be confusing. The real thing I wanted to talk about is that in the past few days I’ve randomly come across several people’s tumblr that reassure people that they’re not just pictures. (Often accompanied by complaining about picture blogs. I think I saw the word meaningless twice.) And that surprised me. Obviously I don’t care if another person’s tumblr is pictures or words or both, nor what they think of picture-only tumblrs. That’s their business not mine.

But I found it interesting that so many people thought this. Because I love pictures on tumblr. Because they serve exactly the same function that arranging objects does: If you look at the pictures I reblog, and you do it just right, you can see important things about me. It’s possible to see me through my words too but it’s much harder. I’m far from a picture thinker, but closer to that than a word thinker. And tumblr pictures will do nicely to convey things.

In some ways, it feels like my writing gives access to my mind, but arranging pictures shows my feelings and other deeper aspects of things I have no word for. My soul, maybe? And yes, even banana slugs and slime molds have their place there. :-P

Notes:
  1. humainsvolants reblogged this from withasmoothroundstone
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