Don’t write, unless you have a story to tell.”
*FOR A LONG TIME MEERA HAD PONDERED THESE WORDS SHE HAD HEARD FROM HER ENGLISH TEACHER, MISS BANERJEE
IF SHE TELLS THE WORLD HER STORY, WOULD THEY BELIEVE HER?*
For thirteen year old Meera, the world is a colourful and wonderful place. But it was different a few years ago.
It all started when Meera was in Kindergarten. Her teacher, Miss Williams, had asked the class to draw an apple tree. Meera drew the best apple tree she could. Her teacher praised her and was pleased. “What a beautiful Apple tree you have drawn, Meera.” She exclaimed, holding up the white crumpled piece of paper up for the whole class to examine.
Meera had drawn the best apple tree in the class and she was given a prize for it. The next day, Miss Williams brought her a real apple to eat, from the market place.
That was the last time she ever won a prize at school. After that had come the Alphabet.
Meera sighed as she sat down to finish her homework. Homework was difficult.
The first day her teacher wrote ‘A’ on the blackboard, she looked at Meera expectantly. “Do you know what this is, Meera?”
Meera stared back at the letter. It could only be...
There was pin drop silence as her teacher looked at her strangely. She didn’t reply but asked Rohan, the boy in the third row to answer.
“A... A for Apple.” Rohan chimed shyly.
That day, Meera went back home and opened the first book on the coffee-table. ‘Cricket for Dummies.’ Her dad read that a lot. She called her mum.
“Where is ‘A’?” She could see the strange letter that looked like a tent on stilts in the book. It was red like an apple. But then her mum pointed out ‘a’ in the word ‘bat’ and it was green like a caterpillar. And the same letter ‘a’ in ‘ball’ was mango-lemon. Meera also heard a strange ‘swissshh’ sound when her mother read out ‘bat’.
“It’s all different Mummy.” she whined.
Now Meera’s parents loved her very much but they could not understand why she was seeing things differently. Some days her mother scolded her because she did not want to go to school any more. But her father was patient with her. He lovingly coaxed her into going to school, even though she was not doing that well.
Her teachers at school were worried.
“Have you considered a special school?” Miss Williams asked her mother at the end of Kindergarten.
However, they went through the tough decision of keeping her in school. Mrs Gupta sat with Meera everyday and tried to make her learn the letters by heart.
Meera put in more effort in writing and reading, and they promoted her class after class, because of her exceptional grades in Mathematics, Art and Music. In all this, her parents were her constant support.
Her father even started visiting local doctors to find out if Meera had a disability. But he never made her feel ‘different’.
Every night, tired after being bullied at school, Meera found it difficult to sleep. But her father used to calm her by telling her magical stories.
One day, Meera asked her father.
“How beautiful these stories are! I wish I can make a story someday.”
Her father smiled at her and encouraged her to make her own story. And for the first time, Meera felt that she could achieve something again. She made up her mind to write a magical story.
But then the next problem emerged. How could she write a story when she was having difficulty in reading words and long books? So she locked away her dream in a multi-coloured box and never thought about writing a story again.
That is when her seventh grade English teacher, Miss Banerjee stepped in.
One day in class, she announced.
“We will work on writing for the Summer vacation. You can write on anything you feel like. It can be long or short. But it must come from you.”
The class was in chaos. Students were high-fiving and smiling but Meera was slinking slowly down in her seat.
“And remember class, SHOW, don’t TELL.”
“But don’t write unless you have a story to tell.”
Meera raised her hand slowly.
“ What should I write about, miss?”
“Write a story about your world.”
Miss Banerjee replied, “Paint with words.”
Meera brightened up instantly. This is what she always wanted to hear!
The following weekend, Meera eagerly sat down to her writing task. The world was suddenly brighter and full of colour. She wrote about a family which had a mother and a father that were loving like her parents. The story was a happy one. The parents always ate dinner together with their children- a daughter and twin sons.
Miss Banerjee was very happy with Meera’s story.
“What a lovely dinner scene you have described Meera. The twin boys are so naughty. And the mother is such a good cook. What has she made for the main course?”
“Chicken.” Said Meera confidently. Meera was a vegetarian but always curious about her friends who ate meat. She was strange like that.
Miss Banerjee chuckled, “What kind of Chicken, beta?”
“The chicken is blue.” Meera said tentatively.
Miss Banerjee was silent for awhile. She looked at Meera and asked her to sit down near her.
“What do you think of when I say ‘potato’?
“It is a brown vegetable.” Meera replied in monotone.
“Is it a music instrument? It makes a strange whistling sound in my head.”
Miss Banerjee thanked Meera and told her to go to her seat.
The next day, Miss Banerjee called Meera’s parents, without her knowing.
Her mother was concerned but her father seemed calm.
“Mr and Mrs Gupta. It seems to me, Meera has a condition. it is brilliant and terrifying at the same time. It must be used to help her and aid her, and it will be a gift to her. I have reason enough to believe that Meera hassynaesthesia.”
Meera’s parents stared blankly back at Miss Banerjee.
“You don’t have to worry. it is a genetic condition where the senses of a person are mixed up. Something like cross-wiring of the senses. If you say a word, they will see a colour. If they hear a sound, they may taste an essence. I have strong reason to believe that Meera has lexical synaesthesia, which could be the reason why she has had problems with reading and writing for so long.”
“How do you know so much?” Mrs Gupta asked, bewildered. It was a lot of information to take in.”
“I was under observation for the last ten years when I was in Chicago, at the University. I had Synaesthesia. But a different kind-*Chromesthesia*. People with chromesthesia hear sounds and these automatically and unintentionally make them experience colours.” Miss Banerjee finished.
Because of Miss Banerjee and Meera’s parent’s hard work and loving support, Meera began to use her words to express her world more. Instead of locking the colours in- she poured them out, mainly in Art, but also in words.
It turned out that you can paint with both.
All you need is a story to tell.
