What I Watched -- The Diving Bell and the Butterfly

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly is the true story of Jean-Dominique Bauby, or Jean-Do, as he is known to his friends. He is -- was -- the editor of Elle Magazine in France, until a stroke left him paralyzed from head to toe, with the exception of his left eye.

Communicating only by blinking, Jean-Do calls in an outstanding book deal, and uses it to tell the story of his life with "locked-in syndrome." Through the story and flashbacks to his earlier life, you see the amazing contrast between the vibrant, fun-loving, carefree (but still responsible) man living it up in Paris, and the immotile man confined to a bed or a wheelchair in a hospital on the northern coast town of Berck-sur-Mer.

Two things about Jean-Do's story are astonishing. The first is that the story is not depressing. I mean this in a couple of ways. One is that, despite the obvious sadness for his lost life, Jean-Do (at least in the movie; who knows about real life?) does not pity himself in his new condition. He just sets about his task of writing, once he figures out how to do it. Another is that, despite his job in the crazy world of magazines and modeling, his three children out of wedlock, and his free love, Jean-Do cares for his aging father, sees his children and their mother, and maintains what appears to be a stable life. His injury occurred by no fault of his own; he was not drunk or on drugs. He just had a stroke which -- don't get me wrong -- is sad, but not depressing.

The second astonishing thing about Jean-Do's story is that he was able to compose and edit his book in his head, and remember it well enough to have it transcribed one letter at a time, in a manner that seems terribly tedious to those of us who retain our writing and typing faculties. Even if his mind was "locked-in," it was still pretty incredible.