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Baited Kerosene
Sep. 23rd, 2001 02:15 amMy body produces a surfeit of vitamin A. I don't pretend to know how this is possible, since it has always been my understanding that vitamins must be intaken from external sources; then again, biology is the one science that never particularly interested me. What matters is the fact that my body does, never mind how, manufacture more vitamin A than I require, even when I fast.
The symptoms are mild enough to be missed unless one is either partly hypochondrical or prone to recognizing apparently disparate phenomena as patterns. The most obvious is that I shed hair at a notably higher rate than the average person. I'm not balding or anything -- my hair is perfectly healthy. Remarkably healthy for someone who has played with so many hair colors. It's just that over the course of the day, I accumulate several fallen follicles on my shoulders, and have since I was very young.
Secondarily, I drink a great deal more water than anyone else I know, to the point where other people call me "the camel" and guard their glasses when I'm around. Not that it makes any difference; I will slip in through the cracks and drink their water. It is only a matter of time, and generally not much. I cannot remember an age when I wasn't constantly thirsty, even while drinking; I sometimes wonder how much this has shaped my personality.
Other idosyncracies are less noticable. I don't take multivitamins, and I feel ill when I do. If I eat more than a very small amount of raw carrot, it starts to taste metallic and poisonous. Which it is -- vitamin A overdoses are not to be taken lightly. Carotene is quite toxic and can do severe damage to the liver and kidneys. I occasionally have the same problem with spinach, and I tend to avoid lettuce, nectarine, and more than minimal mellon.
There are, of course, up sides strong enough to outweigh these inconveniences. I have extremely good skin, for instance, whether I bother to take care of it or not. More to the point, I have phenomenal vision and can see clearly in almost total darkness. As a child, I amused myself by reading billboards while my airplane was in a holding pattern above the airport. [My vision is no longer that good. -Ed.]
This I know has done a good deal to make me the person I am today, the neologician who others all fear. Even though I am ostensibly a musician, I view the world almost entirely visually. (My teachers were always very annoyed by how much I relied on my sightreading ability.) I tend, shallow as this is, to date very beautiful people. I like to own very beautiful things. I spend as much time as possible in purple sunglasses to enrich the colors I see.
When I ask people why they find me unsettling, or assume me to be much older than I am, the answer inevitably comes that it's my eyes. I focus with too much intensity, stare too long, own people with my pupils. Arielle says I seem perfectly safe as long as you can't see my eyes; otherwise, you realize I'm more than capable of killing someone.
Perhaps this is why I've always been obsessed with the idea of glasses. I have several pairs of non-prescription frames, and a drawer full of cheap sunglasses that I never wear.
Perhaps this is also why Valancy says I never look like myself when trying any on, even when we search through hundreds of frames. I look as though I'm playing a character.
Except, possibly, for the purple.
The symptoms are mild enough to be missed unless one is either partly hypochondrical or prone to recognizing apparently disparate phenomena as patterns. The most obvious is that I shed hair at a notably higher rate than the average person. I'm not balding or anything -- my hair is perfectly healthy. Remarkably healthy for someone who has played with so many hair colors. It's just that over the course of the day, I accumulate several fallen follicles on my shoulders, and have since I was very young.
Secondarily, I drink a great deal more water than anyone else I know, to the point where other people call me "the camel" and guard their glasses when I'm around. Not that it makes any difference; I will slip in through the cracks and drink their water. It is only a matter of time, and generally not much. I cannot remember an age when I wasn't constantly thirsty, even while drinking; I sometimes wonder how much this has shaped my personality.
Other idosyncracies are less noticable. I don't take multivitamins, and I feel ill when I do. If I eat more than a very small amount of raw carrot, it starts to taste metallic and poisonous. Which it is -- vitamin A overdoses are not to be taken lightly. Carotene is quite toxic and can do severe damage to the liver and kidneys. I occasionally have the same problem with spinach, and I tend to avoid lettuce, nectarine, and more than minimal mellon.
There are, of course, up sides strong enough to outweigh these inconveniences. I have extremely good skin, for instance, whether I bother to take care of it or not. More to the point, I have phenomenal vision and can see clearly in almost total darkness. As a child, I amused myself by reading billboards while my airplane was in a holding pattern above the airport. [My vision is no longer that good. -Ed.]
This I know has done a good deal to make me the person I am today, the neologician who others all fear. Even though I am ostensibly a musician, I view the world almost entirely visually. (My teachers were always very annoyed by how much I relied on my sightreading ability.) I tend, shallow as this is, to date very beautiful people. I like to own very beautiful things. I spend as much time as possible in purple sunglasses to enrich the colors I see.
When I ask people why they find me unsettling, or assume me to be much older than I am, the answer inevitably comes that it's my eyes. I focus with too much intensity, stare too long, own people with my pupils. Arielle says I seem perfectly safe as long as you can't see my eyes; otherwise, you realize I'm more than capable of killing someone.
Perhaps this is why I've always been obsessed with the idea of glasses. I have several pairs of non-prescription frames, and a drawer full of cheap sunglasses that I never wear.
Perhaps this is also why Valancy says I never look like myself when trying any on, even when we search through hundreds of frames. I look as though I'm playing a character.
Except, possibly, for the purple.
