Throughout the reading for class today, I was most focused on a particular phrase in Chapter 6: "Wakefulness is productive. Bliss wastes time." Here, she was discussing how cocaine was viewed by and large as a "happiness drug" while today we refer to caffeine as a "wakefulness drug." In our society today is completely true--especially for a hectic college student--that being awake somehow denotes productivity, progress, and profit while we hesitate to view happiness in and of itself as productive, progressive, and profitable. If I spent my time taking a walk, hiking, reading for pleasure (things that make me "happy") then mostly I would be considered wasting my time, but if I am awake and sitting in an early morning business meeting in a deadened stupor then somehow I am being more in touch with American views on happiness i.e. what is profitable. At a point later in the book, I think Hecht does discuss how money can aid in happiness, but by and large in modern culture how we get money is not also how we become happy. Additionally in this section Hecht is touching on something we've discussed extensively--how products are marketed by appealing to the happiness factor of whatever is being sold example: Coca-Cola.

So, discussion question: What is it about the marketing/selling of drugs that holds such appeal to American buyers and how does this relationship influence our daily lives?

Factual question: In what study did Freud explore his fascination with cocaine?

A: On Cola

-Bonnie W.