Escaping the Dark Stars of Joy
So, I was having my tea the other morning when I hear "Is There a Happiness Gene?" floating out of my television. Another teaser went something like, "a condition that causes extreme joy, but it comes with a price," or something like that. The segment, which was on Good Morning America was about Williams Syndrome, according to GMA's reporters "a condition in which the areas of the brain that process hearing are more rich in connections than a normal brain, resulting in people who experience sound—like music and language—more intensely than the rest of the population. They also tend to be incredibly sociable." The segment featured a young man named Ben Monkaba, who was, indeed, joyful, from the looks of it; he glowed. And it wasn't phony. He made me put down my tea and listen to him. He went straight to my heart. What’s remarkable is that this condition is not brought on by what he does have, but what he doesn’t: He is missing 20 chromosomes on one...