Is Having A Cup Of Coffee Sufficient Enough!

“Have a strong cup of filter coffee,” was what my mother said, all the way from Chennai, when I told her I was feeling low. It was her go-to mood lifter, and she considered nothing above the effects of a good cup of filter coffee.

She refused to see my situation as something more, removed as she was from Philadephia, where I first experienced a sudden and unexplained bout of what I’ll just call the “blues”. It was the initial days of the Internet (pre-Google) and so my friends and I discussed problems that we needed to solve, using our collective wisdom.

I could barely get out of bed, and felt listless the entire day. Even the merry Santa Clauses at the malls failed to lift my spirits. Even spirits failed to lift my spirits.

Several hypotheses were put forth by my (mostly) Indian friends: boy trouble, homesickness, bad grades, quarter-life crisis, and even confusion about my sexual identity (the last was because I like checks, but that’s a different story)!

Not knowing better, I binge-watched movies from home, listened non-stop to AR Rahman’s songs, and drank endless cups of coffee. The net result? I ended up loving all of Rahman’s songs from that year and had a mild case of constipation.

That was when I heard about SAD: Seasonal Affective Disorder, which is caused, among other things, by lack of sunlight. It’s more prevalent in places with shorter days, and is popularly called “winter depression”. Studies on how it actually affects mood are as yet inconclusive, but it has been established that those who are sensitive to light are more prone to it. That sounded a bit circular in logic, but I grabbed any information I could get. I was all over the internet, and the library, which I never entered before, or thence. I found a checklist that could possibly tell me what I thought I already knew: I had SAD! I doubt anyone would have looked at any questionnaire with so much enthusiasm.

Did I work in a place with less sunlight? Yes, the department was in the basement!

Did I find it difficult to adjust to changes in temperature? Yes, I would bundle myself up in fifteen layers in winter!

Did I find it difficult to get out of bed? Errr… only when I had classes, but I checked the box on that one too.

A light bulb went on, literally and metaphorically. Strong white light was the recommended therapy, and my department had one. The effect was dramatic. In less than a week, I felt much better. I still hated to get out of bed, but I marked that one down to the biting cold.

That’s when it hit me. We fail to consider the mind as a physical space, controlled by neurons, chemicals, and enzymes. “Control Your Mind”, “Unlock Your Brain’s Potential”, “The One-Step-Program to a Peaceful Life” are all phrases we consider within the realm of possibility. We think that the facilities of the mind are controlled by a simple hard-to-find switch that turns everything on, sort of like a high schooler’s bra hook.

That the mind can be and is a complex place, and that problems might not be solved simply by “pulling your socks up” is unfathomable to most of us. We are told, through our stories and popular culture, that the mind and the heart (and consequently, “feelings”, that much-maligned word) operate in an incestuous relationship that excludes the physiological, the chemical, the “scientific” if you will.

Searching within oneself is, at one extreme, a pastime. At the other, it’s the ultimate goal. But never a lifelong process, which is what it really is.

The next time I spoke with my mother, I told her about it all.

All she said was, “Really? Light? And you’re feeling better?”

“Yes. Amazing, isn’t it?”

She was silent for a bit and I thought the connection was severed. I heard her sigh, and she followed it with, “So, someone is coming to the U.S. Can I send one kilo special coffee powder?”