Dopa-me

Tonight, I watched Awakenings, an amazing 1990 movie starring Robin Williams and Robert DiNiro. It's a true story about a psychiatrist, Dr. Malcom Sayer, who sensed the humanity locked inside his catatonic patients...and in 1969 discovered that they responded to l-dopamine -- and "awoke." Sadly, the drug failed over time, and the lucid periods didn't last.

The brilliance of the movie lay in the parallel drawn between the "insane" and the sane -- and the contrast between appreciation and complacency. It leaves me to question who is really sick here: the patients who, upon awakening, marvel at every little miracle that graces every single one of each of our days...or the rest of us, who take it all for granted. Sure, every now and then we all wake up and realize how wonderful life really is -- but it seems we all go to sleep again, becoming oblivious to the miracle of common things.

Toward the film's end, the doctor addresses his colleagues:

"What we do know is that, as the chemical window closed, another awakening took place; that the human spirit is more powerful than any drug -- and THAT is what needs to be nourished: with work, play, friendship, family. THESE are the things that matter. This is what we'd forgotten -- the simplest things."

I've been feeling dreary lately, and I think maybe I need to wake up again.