Thursday, October 05, 2006

personal constellations

Pepi: "Tell me more! I want to know all the constellations!"
Homer Simpson: "Well, that one's Jerry, the cowboy. And that big-dipper-looking thing is Alan... the cowboy."
Like the above quote from The Simpsons attests, people like to see familiar things in randomness. Few of the constellations look anything like what they are supposed to portray, but that has not kept humanity from seeing fish, or scorpions, or twins, or bulls, or hunters up there. I am apparently no different.

Any time I visit the bathroom or I lay in bed and have the chance to look at a wall, ceiling, floor, or anything else that looks textured or dotted or splotchy, I see a face or animal or something like that. It is not voluntary. I assume most other people are like that, though I also assume that some people are more prone than others to let their attention be pulled to what might be seen in the texture of a wall.

I find it fascinating that, even though I might look at the same wall day after day I will see something different each time. I usually can't even find the face or animal that I noticed the previous time I looked at that patch of wall.

Sometimes I will be so intrigued about some new character that I noticed on the wall that I get spaced out and get lost in imagination about what that character might be doing in his or her current pose. A few days ago in the shower I determined that the Uncle Sam character that my mind had put together was himself lost in thought with his head turned away from me and leaning on his elbow. Kind of like a nonchalant cowboy.

7 comments:

f o r r e s t said...

Have you seen the pyramids and the sphinx on Mars???

Fascinating...did the aliens put them on Mars before they put them in Eygpt?

Dash said...

I thought the Predators put the big Pyramid in primordial antartica as part of their Alien hunting program. The Egyptian, Peruvian, and Cambodiam cultures were then influenced by the battle temple.

Maybe the Mars pyramid is where they hunt the Wookies?

T said...

Ok, once again I lack complete and total imagination. I have never done this. I had a very difficult time seeing the big and little dipper, but by the time I was older elementary I found them. That's the extent of it for me.

Boy, I am a dull person. I am not good at the ink blot things or any of the artsie fartsie things with pictures inside pictures. It took me about 2 years to realize that the picture in my family room has a person in it--even then I am pretty sure someone else pointed it out to me!

f o r r e s t said...

Dash - I saw that movie!

GoldenSunrise said...

I find faces in the patterns of the drywall/putty on ceilings. I had a face on my bedroom ceiling when I was a girl.

You see the Uncle Sam face in the shower also! J/K : )

windarkwingod said...

ah... "pareidolia"

roamingwriter said...

I see faces too. Clouds are another good one. So is marble tile.