What happens when a system is stressed beyond its ability to right itself? When the wobble becomes a crash? The stretch becomes a rip? The bend a break?

What happens when a lifetime of striving becomes a clear miscalculation of our abilities? When an unexpected stress on a life already stretched too taughtly snaps a string?

If I may paraphrase, civilizations don't end with a great crash but rather with a quiet whimper. I don't know if that is true or not, but it is often the way for individuals. Take a minute and look at us with new eyes. We are different in subtle ways. We have talked about the Parkinson's personality. We have discussed how often we have been the ones that carried the other. That got things done. That sacrificed self for other.

What happens when we finally hit that wall? When the rubber band finally snaps? When we realize that there is no one to save us as we saved others? Not because they don't want to (although sometimes so), but because we can't be saved from our own selves? You save me today and I guarantee you that I will take your investment and "waste" it saving someone else. Hell, I can't even type it without quotes.

We are, each in our own way, pathological Saviors. We carry our weight and always some extra. If the train runs on time, you can bet that one of us saw to it that the clock was set correctly.

That is all very admirable and I am proud to be in your company. I can't imagine any other way to be. But this way of being has a cost. We hit that wall and then try to clean up the mess, for crying out loud. But we don't cry out. Except maybe here among our own kind.

I think Coleman recognizes this. It has been awhile since I looked in, but as I remember the people on his site had an upbeat vibe. If it turns out that the box he offered proved empty, he isn't going any deeper into hell than the guys making Sinemet.

He just might be onto something. He may not even know it. But to "cure" ourselves, one of the first steps has to be to reinvent ourselves. To learn that it is OK to be a little selfish. PD is not a disease, but rather a state of being that has taxed us beyond the limits of our powers to right ourselves.