In an essay called “Self-Respect,” Ms. Didion offers the only strategy that has ever consistently helped me regain my mommy peace once I’ve lost it:

 

“It was once suggested to me that as an antidote to crying, I put my head in a paper bag. As it happens, there is a sound physiological reason, something to do with oxygen, for doing exactly that, but the psychological effect alone is incalculable. It is difficult in the extreme to continue fancying oneself Cathy in Wuthering Heights with one’s head in a food fair bag. There is a similar case for all the small disciplines, unimportant in themselves; imagine maintaining any sort of swoon, commiserate or carnal, in a cold shower.”

I love this. The whole essay is great.

Careful examination discloses that disadvantaged students have made spectacular progress in the last generation, in regular public schools, with ordinary teachers. Not only have regular public schools not been “the great discriminator” — they continue to make remarkable gains for minority children at a time when our increasingly unequal social and economic systems seem determined to abandon them.

I'm not suggesting this is the end of the story...FAR from it. But in the midst of the rhetoric, it's important to make sure we have our facts straight and not just buy into stuff that sounds like it jives with our own prejudice.

Unfortunately, the real story is complicated and, in a way, not all that reassuring. Researchers don't really know what causes depression. They're making progress, but they don't know. That's the real story.

It's not exactly a blockbuster.