The cortex is the brain’s stage and its spotlight, a wrinkled sheet of grey matter where everything that makes us human performs. It is thin, standing only a few millimetres tall, and yet, it holds our language, laughter, memories, dreams, passwords, and grudges. Beneath it lies machinery; above it, personality. It’s the surface that thinks. If the brain were Mumbai, the cortex would be South Bombay – dense, opinionated, elegant, and convinced it runs the place.
A 28-year-old advertising executive named Tara came to me after her colleagues noticed that she would suddenly stop mid-sentence, stare into space, and then continue as if nothing had happened. “It’s not stress,” she told me. “Though working in advertising is basically paid stress.” Her MRI showed a small lesion in the left temporal cortex, the patch of brain that handles language and memory. A subtle cortical tumour. It wasn’t big enough to terrify, but mischievous enough to demand attention.
The cortex has the thickness of three credit cards placed on top of each other but with the complexity of the cosmos. Each square millimetre contains thousands of neurons, a buzzing marketplace of thoughts and impulses, all talking over each other in 220-volt enthusiasm. When a tumour grows there, it is like a loud neighbour moving into an already overcrowded apartment block. It’s no wonder, then, that the other residents – speech, comprehension, logic – start complaining.
We decided to remove the tumour. Tara was awake during surgery, so that we could test her speech while working near her language area. Awake brain surgery may sound dangerous to most people, but patients usually find it oddly peaceful. You feel no pain, and you get to talk while someone edits your neurons. Think of it as giving a live TED Talk from the inside of your own head.
Under the microscope, the cortex looked as it always does – pink-grey, shimmering, alive. Its folds rose and dipped like the Western Ghats seen from above. I mapped the surface with tiny electrodes. When she counted numbers and her speech area lit up on the monitor, we marked it safe. Then, millimetre by millimetre, I began removing the tumour, the soft, sticky, slightly rebellious tissue, from a place where words are born.
“Doctor,” she said mid-surgery, “are you sure you’re not deleting my imagination?”
“No,” I said. “Just the part that makes bad taglines.” The room laughed. For a moment, the theatre felt lighter, as if the brain itself were in on the joke. When we finished, the cortex looked serene again, its gentle ripples restored. Tara recovered beautifully. Her speech was intact, her sense of humour sharper than before.
A month later, she sent me an ad campaign she’d worked on, with the tagline “A mind is a terrible thing to waste, so I didn’t.”
The cortex is where we live, although we rarely think about it. It turns electricity into ideas, sound into language, light into meaning. It lets us write poetry, cook biryani, remember our exes, and occasionally forget their birthdays. It gives the brain personality, and with that, irony, that such a delicate film of matter can hold all the weight of who we are. When I look at it under the microscope, I often reaffirm to myself that this is the edge of existence. Below it are reflexes and rhythms; above it, everything that makes us sentient. The cortex is where biology becomes biography.
We surgeons tread lightly here. We don’t just cut tissue; we edit identity. Every millimetre saved might mean a preserved laugh, a recovered memory, or one more sentence someone will finish one day.
Tara’s MRI is now clear. Her career is back on track, her brain’s advertising budget restored. She still texts me sometimes, signing off, “To my favourite copy editor, the one who worked inside my head.” And I reply, “Just did some market research!”
23 thoughts on “The Cortex”
Morning Doc,
Think I need to visit you. I conveniently keep forgetting the many times I’m told not to eat sweet delicacies and the times I’m told to do active exercises. Jokes apart, this was an article I could keep reading – cos I am really forgetful.
Maybe an excuse to visit you.☺️
Lovely article making a pleasant read on a Sunday morning. Always interesting
Lovely
This was a very encouraging and happy ending for Tara.
Your article, the previous one made me shed tears , the one of loneliness in hospital and old age…I could not bear to read that article knowing the reality of it, and how sad life can be.
I wish there was no sadness in this world, but it would be a very unrealistic wish!
Thank you for sharing.
Your articles are so informative, lighthearted and make for easy reading.
Blessing to you Dr Mazda. Keep up the good work.
You make the surgery sound so fun for us readers that I’m sure some of us would like to get one too just to hang out with you 😅
I had seen the movie ‘Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind’ and thought it was just some science fiction but this article makes it real and so cool.
Thanks for inhabiting our cortex and gifting us these gems in small weekly doses.
Hi Mazda Your weekly articles are always interesting 🧐 and I look forward to reading them. 😊
Dearest Dr Mazda sir ……
Very very happy to read your stunning piece on CORTEX returning back with your HUMOROUS style
Comparison with 3 Credit cards , western Ghats , joke in OT & South Bombay………
Thanks for explaining step by step removal of mischievous small tumor, which needs attention…….
What a lovely explanation on Procedure while talking to patient in the middle of surgery…….
Bravo sir – God bless you always with abundant strength in your Brain , Hands & Spine to take care of Brain & Spine of numerous patients at Large .
Brilliant as usual! Dr Mazda. Loved reading it!
God bless you with a long happy healthy prosperous and contented life so that you continue to alleviate the miseries of suffering humanity for a long time. Good luck and God bless. Firoza and Zinoo Master
Dear Mazda,
So many have already commented on the article.
But the line that is absolutely your piece-de-resistance is “Cortex is where biology becomes biography”!
What a beautiful comment!
Without taking anything away from your heartwarming article, I’d like add Mazda’s surgical writing is where composition becomes compassion!
You endear yourself to me with every article.
And just when I think I’ve read it all, Mazda spins his spell again!!
Another Sunday, another masterclass.
Only you could give the cortex South Bombay’s personality and then turn open brain surgery into a TED Talk.
You remind us, with your usual mix of science and soul, that the cortex is where biology becomes biography 🙃 and somehow, great storytelling
A great article. You prove that having a sense of humour is a prerequisite to be a good neurosurgeon!
A winter sunday morning with a lovely aromatic cup 0f my favourite tea and ur sunday writing makes my sundays very special. Every article is so informative yet so interesting. The same is true with the Cortex.Thanks for including me among ur readers.
Thank you once again for your Sunday article..behind the humour and wit lies a brilliant surgeon and a great human being..God bless you
Superb 👌
Oh my dearest Sir.
I feel like have your Darshan one day and be blessed. (I am 70 yrs)You are an artist in the body of a Neurosurgeon.
( My long standing query is ” A thought are of 2 types: one-not under our control & arrives on its own, other- we decide to think about. How and where are they ” generated” ? )
Oh my dearest Sir.
I feel like have your Darshan one day and be blessed. (I am 70 yrs)You are an artist in the body of a Neurosurgeon.
( My long standing query is ” A thought are of 2 types: one-not under our control & arrives on its own, other- we decide to think about. How and where are they ” generated” ? )
I think I almost have the same problem like I keep my house keys on a table move forward to switch the room light, and when I turned around I have to think where the keys are kept but later I find. I am 78 and say it’s Alzimer for old age. What do say DR MAZDA TUREL SIR.
Another feather in the cap….Editor… albeit of the brain!!!
An intricate surgical intervention made to look ridiculously easy by a skilled artist. The play of words makes the reader lighter. Keep both the surgeries and stories about them coming.
This makes me define many cortexes of my life apart from the biological one , absolutely brilliant Dr 💖
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aided me. Good job.