From our earthly point of view, there’s something immensely unsatisfying about Paradise. There’s no dramatic tension. Nobody even learns anything except Dante. He has to take a crash course in all of creation. Beatrice and the other inhabitants spend countless cantos deconstructing—with a tinge of Zen-masterly impatience—virtually everything he knew before, and then reconstructing—with a tinge of professorial long-sufferance—a world view that reconciles contradictions that no living rational mind would dare try to reconcile. Most of these discourses come down to explaining why if God is perfect, everything else isn’t. (Although, of course, it is.) Explanations that, for the most part, would truly only make sense in a late-night college “bull session.”
As they arrive at the Empyrean (the highest level of Paradise) Beatrice drifts away to return to her rightful place in the Celestial Rose. The great contemplative St. Bernard then takes over and directs Dante’s gaze to the Virgin Mary herself who is at the pinnacle of the Rose, surrounded by thousands of angels. Bernard beseeches her to let Dante look directly into the Light. The thousands of angels join in his prayer. Mary grants his wish.
And what is that wish? Nothing less than being allowed to use this precious, once-in-anyone’s-lifetime opportunity to understand the scheme of all things and where he fits in it. This is a question we all struggle with and he’s going to get to ask it. Of God Himself! Maybe there is a climax to this story after all!
Sure enough! God answers his question … in a bolt of lightning, no less!
Unfortunately, at that moment, Dante is abandoned by memory and words themselves. For a writer, the ultimate exile.
After experiencing all he can possibly experience, and learning all he can possibly learn, and meeting thousands of spirits who know and accept exactly where God has placed them, we’re still left to wonder, what is Dante’s place? And more important: what’s ours?
Miracle of Miracles
Suddenly I understand that I am happy.
For months this feeling
has been coming closer, stopping
for short visits, like a timid suitor.
—JANE KENYON
Pharmaceutical wonders are at work
but I believe only in this moment
of well-being.
—JANE KENYON
IN LATE FEBRUARY 2007, an odd thing happened. Wendy and I were on the phone with Emily. Which, in those days, meant me lying on the bed with the extension to my ear while they talked. I had nothing positive to contribute to the conversation. I didn’t even try. But I liked listening.
Toward the end of the call, Em started talking about a cat that some friends had to give away. They’d just gotten two dogs and the cat was totally freaked out. She said he was the most affectionate hunk of cat she’d ever been with. He’d curl up—all 20 or so pounds of him—against the nearest human body and respond orgasmically to even the mildest petting. Scratch his belly, and he was toast.
She encouraged us to take him.
I said yes right away.
We were all kind of shocked.
It was the first definitive decision I’d made in a long time.
Clearly Tito needed us. And the feeling was way more than mutual.
Over the next few months, I spent a lot of time with Tito. It was like he could take all 220 amps of my high-frequency agitation and step it down to 110 or lower without skipping a beat. For him, all that mattered was the scratching. The fact that I was dumb as a post and as wired as a fur brush made me the perfect companion.
On the Ides of March 2007, I ran into a friend on the street—a fellow sufferer in complete remission—who asked me how it was going. Being known for my articulate way with words, I answered the way I usually did back then … I started crying. Told her we were thinking about second opinions, about inpatient psych, about … about … about …
“Okay, that’s enough,” she said. She didn’t mean my crying. She meant the madness. “Call this guy. Make an appointment. Today.”
The next day she called and I told her I couldn’t get an appointment for a month. “No. He’s going to see you in a couple of days,” she said, like it was a done deal. “I’ll call.” She made it happen.
And so, on the first day of spring, March 21, 2007, I sat in a different doctor’s office with Wendy, my head down, eyes averted, again trying to describe how I felt.
Within a month, I began to feel the Titanic turn around. And just in time.
I know there are cases in which people feel immediate results from a medication, but, painful as it was, I accepted that it might take a while for me to work my way to the surface.
At the time, I was taking Depakote, Effexor, and Valium. I no longer really knew which was doing what, but little if any of them were doing much good.
I left the office with a prescription for Klonopin to replace the Valium, instructions for going off the Effexor, a plan to start on Cymbalta, and a special tri-fold five-week starter pack that held precise blister-packed dosages of Depakote and Lamictal … steadily decreasing the one while increasing the other. I wish I’d saved it as a kind of mnemonic device. Because over the next month, that innocent little pharmaceutical package was as powerful as any totem. There was something reassuring about it. Like someone in some lab somewhere had figured out exactly what I needed down to the merest milligram. No longer was I taking a pill or two every day and hoping for the best. I was following a precise bread-crumbed road to salvation.
Toward the end of the appointment, the doctor suggested—that’s putting it mildly—that I stop drinking.
“How long?” I asked.
“A month,” he said, and then paused. “Then another month.”
“Uh, okay,”
“Then another month.”
“Uh, okay … you know I really only have a beer or glass of wine a night. It’s the only thing I can confidently look forward to every day.”
“Six months in all would be good.”
“Uh …”
“I mean, you’re strong minded. Don’t beat your head against the wall. If you have one you have one. But it will give us a purer trial … a clearer picture of how the meds are affecting you.”
I stopped drinking. Until one cold raw day in Nova Scotia, five and a half months later when I celebrated my newfound humanness by ordering a shot of Jameson’s. Just one.
On March 26, 2007, I wrote: “This is the first morning that I’ve woken up in months … literally months … when this living thing doesn’t seem like such a bad idea after all.”
On April 3, I wrote: “I’m borderline better this A.M. I’m finding a little balance between keeping my head clear and optimistic and my body relaxed. Sure slept a lot last night.”
On April 22, I cracked completely. But it was different. It was as if I was slowly becoming broader and deeper—able to hold the flood within the banks instead of being overwhelmed. Later that day, Emily sent me an extraordinary email that took my breath away and left me with a deep yearning to be whole again.
On April 29, I wrote: “The most important thing is I’m starting to have ideas again. I used to have to carry that little tape recorder because so much was pouring out. Now it’s just a little pocket notebook to jot the occasional one down. It’s a start, an important one. It connects with the ‘beautiful urgency’ of writing, as someone said (maybe me!) I still have to be a little careful. I start to think about all the phrases I want to craft and the books I want to write and I get overwhelmed. Still, it’s comforting to be able to look ahead. And I’m much more confident that, when the time comes, the words will be there.”
On May 5, I stayed in bed until 10 A.M. Sure, I was visiting my mom’s and had stayed up talking to her until midnight … which I never did at home. Sure, I woke up at 6 A.M with a little agitation—the little agitation that used to be a big agitation. Sure, I took a little nibble of Klonopin. But, the fact was I stayed in bed for ten whole hours. To most people, that would seem ordinary at best and lazy at worst. For me, i
t was a major triumph over the vagaries of time, space, and adrenal glands.
On May 7, I began using the phrase “significantly better” in emails and conversations.
On May 10, I wrote to a friend: “I don’t say, ‘David’s back.’ I say he’s forward.”
On May 11, I did my first new writing in months—(as opposed to desultory editing just to keep busy.) It was like my vision was coming back.
On May 21, I felt a strong dip, but managed not to follow it down.
On May 25, I felt confident enough to tell Emily I felt better and to make plans for my birthday since Wendy was going to be away.
On May 30, I crashed again. For about an hour. Screaming and dry heaving in the cabin. As bad as ever. Why? Why? Was it because I didn’t feel I needed the Klonopin to sleep anymore so I’d skipped a couple of nights? Was it because I’d gone for a really hard bike ride the day before? Regardless, I came in the house, took .5 mg of Klonopin, and lay down quietly. After an hour or two I was okay, shaky but okay.
On June 8, a tie rod on my lawn tractor broke. As I was crawling under it to see what was wrong, I felt a twinge in my back. I’d pinched a nerve. To both events, I said, “Oh well.” I simply called the repair place about picking up the lawn mower. (So the grass will grow a little, so what?). And arranged appointments with a chiropractor and massage therapist. (So my back/leg will hurt for a little while, so what?) The fact that neither upset me all that much was thrilling. Like I had found a way to sneak out of the darkness and none of its resident demons had noticed.
On June 15, I turned 55. Emily came down. I had something to celebrate.
On July 8, I wrote a friend: “I’m doing very well and enjoying the simple pleasures of just being able to write emails, read junky mysteries, watch baseball, work on our labyrinth, go for bike rides, etc. I’m even moving ahead with my writing. There’s a lot of work to do, but I look at it now as a ‘feast’ to engage in slowly, rather than feeling compelled to get done as quickly as possible. It’s like I’m learning how to be in the world again.”
Crazy Wisdom and Creativity
The question is not yet settled, whether madness is or is not the loftiest intelligence … whether all that is profound does not spring from disease of thought.
—EDGAR ALLAN POE
What makes Paradiso so difficult is that it is dedicated to its own impossibility. Language is forced to reveal its shortcoming.
—HARRIET RUBIN
WHILE MOST PEOPLE don’t end up writing masterpieces during periods of manic-depression, they often do things that make their friends think, “they’re out of their minds.” They blow all their money in Las Vegas; get passionate about collecting golf balls; drop out of school; leave their spouses, etc.
While mental instability can trigger or be triggered by all of the above, it’s rooted, fundamentally, in some imbalance inside oneself—like there’s an internal gyroscope spinning out of control. These people aren’t out of their minds, their minds are out of kilter. Depending on the adjustments they make—medical or otherwise—this behavior recedes and, in many cases, is integrated into who they are.
Maybe that’s why people have such a hard time recognizing underlying depression in others. It’s one thing when you sit on your bed all day, head in hands—like those sanitized images from the TV commercials—in that case, the diagnosis is pretty easy. It’s even easier when you walk down the street ranting and raving about how you saw Jesus drinking coffee at Dunkin’ Donuts. But when you manage, at least to all appearances, to keep that chaotically whirling gyroscope out of sight, most people are fooled most of the time.
Sanity is simply the ability to function in your particular culture and society without pushing the envelope too far. Something that is far different—and often far more sophisticated—in an ancient tribal culture than it is on Wall Street.
Insanity (which should really be called un-sanity) is an inability to accept the story of reality that is being put forward by the overwhelming majority.
One of the hallmarks of my generation is that we couldn’t accept the story of reality that was being put forward by the overwhelming majority. Back in the 1960s, when psychologist R. D. Laing said, “Insanity is the only sane response to an insane world,” novelist Kurt Vonnegut said, “A sane person to an insane society must appear insane,” and filmmaker Akira Kurosawa said, “In a mad world, only the mad are sane,” they were preaching to the choir.
We eagerly followed their lead by immersing ourselves in any form of psychological, psychic, religious, or spiritual exploration we could get our hands on or heads around. And there were many. In particular, we had ready access to LSD and other drugs that could cause temporary (hopefully) psychosis and to “secret” spiritual techniques from the East that had never before been widely available in America.
By making the experiences of both temporary enlightenment and mental illness available even to those who weren’t so inclined, these developments made us question our fundamental assumptions about sanity; and in the process, become aware of the seamless continuum between insanity, sanity, and spirituality.
In a legendary story from the 1960s, one day Baba Ram Dass (formerly Richard Alpert, Timothy Leary’s Harvard colleague) finally convinced his Indian guru Maharaji to take some LSD. For the next several hours, he waited patiently for his master to start “tripping his brains out.” All that happened is that Maharaji’s smile got a little brighter. Similarly, when Aldous Huxley took some LSD while on his deathbed, he smiled and said, “Just as I thought.”
My study habits during freshman year in college reflected this unconventional way of discovering the “secrets” of the universe. Before writing an important paper, I’d procrastinate as long as possible and then scan the required texts, highlighting or making margin notes on random passages that interested me. Then, about 48 hours before the paper was due, I would take some hallucinogen.
In the hours that followed—while trying to ignore troublesome thoughts about my love life and images of campus dogs who had a disturbing tendency to turn into man-eating wolves—I’d have insights that connected many of the most important ideas in the assigned books with seemingly relevant facts from the realms of current events, historical trivia, existential philosophy, avant-garde French movies, and quantum mechanics.
After a fitful sleep and a few cups of coffee, I could usually put together an “A” paper. Seriously. I was already a good writer, and by then, ideas were mere playthings.
I tell this story not to encourage anyone to follow my example. (Which is more likely to lead to dismissal than high honors [sic].) But it’s important to point out that for many people in my generation, Dante’s deep, I daresay, hallucinogenic attempt to encompass all of the known and unknown universe in one vision made what he was trying to do as revelatory as the words he ended up using to do it.
There’s a comprehensive and insightful history of LSD called Storming Heaven. The title alone explains why many of us took hallucinogens. In large part, we did not use the drug “recreationally” (unless you parse the word as “re-creation-ally.”) Instead, between being taught to dive under our desks to avoid nuclear attacks, watching Kennedy get assassinated on TV, and seeing our contemporaries disappear into the quagmire of Vietnam, we were afflicted by a profound hopelessness about the future, and willing do whatever it took, regardless of the cost, to figure out what the hell we were doing on earth, a.k.a., the meaning of life.
LSD seemed to offer a way out of this earthly hell that we’d somehow been born into. For a few bucks, we could explore the limits of Dantean cosmological insights, complete with visuals worthy of William Blake. We were only in our late teens or early twenties, but we were storming heaven and hell-bent on unlocking its mysteries.
Still, within hours or days, the drug usually dumped us unceremoniously back in the darkest of woods. While a few found themselves in disassociated—yes, insane—states from which they never recovered, many of us ended up dazed and confused but
deeply, urgently, curious.
And so we began a lifelong search to integrate what we’d seen and sensed into our ordinary lives. Deep study, meditation, and other spiritual practices—frequently accompanied by long periods of depression and even addiction—often played significant roles in our purgatories.
Our generation forced its way into parts (and configurations) of the brain that are rarely explored. We went all the way out to the limits of our individual and group consciousness in order to find our way into the limits of our being. We learned to walk into the labyrinth and then out of the labyrinth. Into the labyrinth and then out of the labyrinth. Realizing and releasing attachments and gathering insights along the way.
In some traditions the result is often called “crazy wisdom.”
In our tradition, it’s usually called one or the other. Or sometimes, “creativity …”
Major depression and/or mania—frequently accompanied by serious indulgence in drink or drugs—are often associated with creativity. Baudelaire, Dickinson, Van Gogh, Nietzche, Woolf, Plath, Rothko, and a host of rock and roll stars. I mean even Bert on Sesame Street has mood swings.
From manic visionary biblical prophets to brilliant, stark-raving-mad artists to tragically suicidal writers, the mentally ill have a prominent place in the cultural history of humanity. And their treatment—whether it involves being worshipped, ignored, put in straightjackets, burned at the stake, or given Pulitzer Prizes—speaks way more volumes about the society and times they lived in than it does about the creative people themselves.
David's Inferno Page 21
