All I could kept thinking about during 'A Separation' was how I never want to live if I ever get Alzheimer's Disease (for my sake and my family's sake) - a life without a mind is no life at all.
Ironic.
I wasn't thinking this exact thing, but something related. A friend - a former student - wrote to me this evening and told me the doctors think his mother has
Huntington's disease. If she does (blood tests forthcoming), there's a 50% chance he (and his brother) has it. If he does have it, that means he'll be dead in 20-25 years and at least 10 of those years will be spent in a growing physical and mental deterioration until, finally, 24 hour care will be needed. Depression and suicide are common among people with Huntington's, apparently.
My friend is an amazingly sharp, creative, self-aware, sensitive, and talented person, and the cards have been stacked against him his whole life (horrible, hellish stuff he's had to live through and still has to deal with). If there's this, too . . . ?
Feeling so burdened for him. His email was straightforward and dry, but I know that's not how he's feeling.