I was quite young when I realized my "mind's eye" is blind.

Unlike the majority of people who can "see" stuff in their head, I do not. When I try to close my eyes and envision a red apple, I see only darkness. The closest I can get is to think about a red apple and describe it's attributes to myself while seeing absolutely nothing.

This condition is called "aphantasia."

And if you're wondering what I'm talking about, then there's a test you can take to understand it a bit. My answer to every one of the questions is the first one: No image at all, I only know I am thinking of the object. Coupled with this is also a condition called "Severely Deficient Autobiographical Memory" (SDAM). This means that not only can I not envision things in my mind's eye... I also cannot re-experience past events.

An example of SDAM is me thinking back to when I was in Rome and staying at a hotel at the top of the Spanish Steps. I remember trudging up the stairs with a gelato cone. I can remember what the texture and color of the steps were. I can remember the buildings and the people. I haven't forgotten a thing. But when I close my eyes and try to re-live the experience, there's nothing there...

And so... now you know why I take hundreds of pictures whenever I travel somewhere. It's the only way I can visually re-experience what I experienced is to look at the images and videos.

Since I've had this condition since birth (or so I'm guessing), I don't know what I'm missing. I've never experienced it. But I am extremely jealous of people who can. I would love to be able to close my eyes and see my mom's face. Or the places I've been.

Between all this and my mild dyslexia, I'm assuming that my brain damage makes my life a bit less fun than most people's.

This also extends to how I dream.

In that I don't. I'm never having these vivid dreams where I'm flying... or walking on Mars... or whatever. It's always the same. When I'm "dreaming" it's like I'm sitting in front of a screen where I'm "drawing" the objects by description. I'm not actually seeing anything in my head. Which is not much fun at all.

But anyway...

The reason all this popped into my head just now is that J. Craig Venter died.

He's the genius geneticist who was the first to decode a bacteria genome, which lead to a genetics renaissance which culminated in decoding the human genome.

He also had aphantasia...

Rest in Peace, sir.