English mystic, poet, printer and all-around weirdo William Blake coined the phrase beloved by hedonists the world over:
the road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom.
Since Blake published this in the late 18th century, artists as diverse as Byron, Wilde, Burroughs and Jim Morrison have embraced it as a clarion call to party-til-ya-puke-and/or-die. (I think most people my age first heard the phrase issue from Susan Sarandon's lips in Bull Durham.) But surely, self-destruction by one's own hand with recreational chemicals leads more often to high-profile rehab centers than any palace of wisdom; if the latter was the case, Ozzy Osbourne would be our generation's Wittgenstein.
So what was Blake referring to? I've always thought, in my uninformed way, he meant an excess of knowledge and experience, not absinthe or acid; nor, in observance of the holiday season, an excess of turducken and gravy. (And certainly not my excessive use of the semicolon.)
As Americans, we tend to pack away food and drink like everyday is Thanksgiving. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that by the year 2020, 1 out of 4 of us will be clinically obese. As a nation, it seems we literally embrace Blake's words as manifest destiny: while still comprising less than 6% of the world's population, we consume more than 2/3's of its resources. And we're none the wiser for it, having elected George W. twice--twice!--and currently have Sarah Palin looming as a serious-as-congestive-heart-failure candidate in 2012.
So how much is too much? All a matter of personal preference, I guess. For myself, "too much" has always translated into "not nearly enough." Food isn't an issue with me; I could take it or leave it. But it's nothing for me to down, in rapid succession over an afternoon, 12 beers, half a pack of Marlboros, numerous tokes of several different types of weed, and whatever other psychoactive pill, alkaloid, or fungus is at hand. (Granted, I actually have cut down my intoxicants over the years, but in the words of PJ O'Rourke, I ingest "...more than I should, but not as much as I used to.") Some would refer to my intake as "living life to the fullest" rather than "chronic substance abuse;" naturally I prefer the former as it possesses a more epicurean lilt.
But it's not just sensual, chemical excesses I embrace. I can honestly and proudly proclaim myself as a hopeless book junkie. I read with a hunger that borders on pathological desperation; I am indeed depraved in this respect. Once while stranded at an airport with no money, I even pored over a found, battered copy of James Patterson's "Along Came a Spider." (For those non-readers out there, it's the literary equivalent of licking spilled cocaine off the toilet seat in a seedy tavern's restroom, which I also did once in another lifetime.)
As a (sometime) poet, I am also excessive in wolfing down moments. To me, poetry is distilling seemingly mundane, daily events into transcendent metaphors. So it's not unusual for me to become utterly verklempt --antidepressants notwithstanding--while watching a mother take her child's hand before crossing a busy intersection, or witnessing a puppy rollicking in an Alpo commercial on TV. Too much, man, I'll say to myself, as I dab at my eyes with a kleenex, then reach for a pen and another Budweiser. Life is, like, too much.
I admit: I'm just another spoiled white male who has squandered the best our culture has to offer. And given my lifestyle, it's doubtful I'll one day publish a bestseller entitled "Centenarian: How I Lived To Age 100." But enough wallowing in excessive self-reflection. Christmas is just over four weeks away and I've yet to buy my loved ones the overpriced, obsolescent electronic crap they simply cannot live without.
Plus I have to order four turduckens for Hanukkah; the two at Thanksgiving didn't cut it.
Happy Holidays,
Wade Trout
P.S. Does anyone know if I can download Blake's "Marriage of Heaven and Hell" onto my Kindle?
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