An hour before dusk the birds start going bananas. Clicking their tongues, chirping, tweeting. The pollen is like lime-green cocaine covering everything. I get to the park so early it’s still dark and the little streams reflect the pale light in the sky and pulse like veins, silver.
Selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, or SSRI antidepressants, boost the mood transmitter serotonin but have been linked to a risk of suicide in a small number of patients. Some new users can “activate” on the medication and experience the opposite effect (not an antidepressant but more of a profound depressant), something about the dopamine receptors and a hyperarousal event.
The boost of sun and pollen in spring can have a counterintuitive effect on people’s moods who are struggling with depression. I always found it strange that people would feel suicidal in spring. But it has such a deep influence on our moods. It feels like I’m charging my brain’s battery for the first time in months. A surge in energy that’s almost manic.
David’s voice sounded different in this book. It’s hard reading something knowing the author was suffering so much: this, the posthumous release from David Foster Wallace, The Pale King. A book about the IRS, about dullness. An unfinished book his widow found in the author’s one-window office, the garage. Then the stacks of notes, a duffel bag and two Trader Joe’s totes full of papers she handed off to David’s editor to reconcile. No outline, no clear beginning or end. That’s The Pale King. If you love the writer you owe it to him to read it, but it’s hard to get beyond the sadness.
I read out of desperation to activate my writer voice. I drive to the park every morning tapping the wheel to the music hoping that could work too. I sit by the window in the recliner with the windows open and the birds and now a jet wondering what my life will be like in 10 years. Probably a lot like it is right now, if I’m lucky.
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Categories: Creative Nonfiction, Diary
Bill Pearse 
Here’s to being able to do the things we do today in ten years time.
And by the way, SSRI studies contain very little evidence that low serotonin levels cause depression. Rather they might work by blunting emotions … so give me birds going bananas instead.
Cheers Bill,
DD
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Blunting emotions sounds right. I’ll take the birds too.
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It’s thought the SSRI for some can give them a boost in energy – enough to carry out any tragic plans – before the root cause of the depression can be addressed or treated. That’s why it’s important to closely monitor people who are new to a prescription, and make sure they’re getting other kinds of support as well, like therapy.
Someone close to me died this way last year.
They have been a godsend for me though (along with therapy etc.) so can attest it does work for others.
Enjoy the lovely spring weather. I am. 🩷
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Yes to the lovely spring weather cj, thanks. We experienced that activation thing with a couple people in our family on the same drug. Definitely important to monitor as you say. And sorry for your loss in that regard. That’s recent. Happy it’s been a godsend for you! Enjoy the season.
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“I read out of desperation to activate my writer voice.” Now that strikes a chord.
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Anything that works!
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Post script. J is working on a close analysis of a Woolf short story. We were talking about what to do when the spark isn’t quite there. So I quoted you.
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Glad I could be an assist, thanks for sharing! Imagine how little it takes in the wild to get a real spark. But it requires some practice and technique. I will never get it down, which is also the mystery and beauty of it.
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I’ve never seen a depressed bird.
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True! Like that.
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