the PDF of her book - National Aphasia Association

Tales from the Other Side of Language 41
complex to me, so I choose two or three blossoms and immerse my eyes in
the individual qualities of each. The bent stem of one leans over, casually
drifts in space. The fluffy edge of a purple aster is disfigured with yellow,
secreting its mortality inside its beauty.
I pare the overabundance of leaves to a few that urge brightly or quiver
around themselves, no vase. My flowers are suspended across the page.
I take a break and walk around the room to look at everyone else’s
work. I see enormous differences. One woman draws her blossoms in a long
row growing out of the bottom of the paper. I find it very odd and childish.
But the judgment recedes, and I see the pleasure in her radical arrangement;
her use of the colored pencils is sharp and bold. I am more tentative. I learn
from her.
The teacher hangs our work on the wall for the last twenty minutes
of each class. She doesn’t critique so much as appreciate. She describes the
special way each of us looked at the same vase of flowers and then set a unique
vision onto the paper. She is supportive of what we see.
This is a profound lesson for me, this intimate act of private seeing. No
“right” way, only the personal way.
My seeing is changing. A new kind of candor emerging.
Everywhere I listen to music—in the streets, on the subway, and
especially between patients. I plug a baroque chamber sound-scape into
my headphones, and the outside chaotic sounds and energies of the city
disengage from my body. My brain floats free in Hayden or Corelli. The
sound is intimate, resonant against the battered walls of my aching brain. It
smoothes on like a salve, and my verbal brain quiets in the surround—as if
the Dalai Lama is chanting.
I have believed that words, good sturdy words, were core to my
existence. To articulate thought well is to be alive, to be seen in the world.
I am learning other ways of being. From drawing I ease into watercolor
painting, tiny brushes and delicate forms, a cluster of daisies with pinks and