Moderation brings the greatest pleasure

‘As someone who enjoys a good drink but doesn’t endorse drunkeness in any way, I found this op-ed on drinking very refreshing – not unlike a good drink!

In the NYT, Paul Clarke writes “Why (and How) I Drink.” Growing up in a Latin-influenced home, alcohol was a normal part of my life. It was also no big deal; so binging never made any sense to me. In high school, friends paid older people to buy alcohol, a practice I never understood since I could have a drink at home if I wanted one. Later, I lived in Italy for six years where drinking simply was not an issue. Although Italians are generally raised with access to alcohol, most of them do not drink to excess. Sure, things are changing now as the family breaks down and mores change. But the general trend was that children grew up in a home seeing their parents enjoy alcohol as a drink and not as a drug, as Chesterton (cited by Clarke) would say.

This comment to Clarke’s article from an Italian paints the picture quite well:

Excellent point. Growing up in Italy, where the stigma on alcohol is (or was) non-existent and where drinking age kicks in just after breast feeding stops, I remember many high-school parties which ended with bottles of booze (gasp!) still sealed and untouched on the tables. There was simply no need to guzzle it up since we all came from families where alcohol was an available, normal and unremarkable part of daily life. True responsibility comes from knowledge and familiarity, and this applies to pretty much anything.

The concept of moderation and familiarity could/should be applied to a lot of things. I can’t help but think that if children see hints of their parents expressing love in an intimate way, say kissing or flirting with each other, they might come to understand that sex, like alcohol, has a place and context. You can binge on “alcoholic slushies”, as Clarke refers to them, or you can savor and enjoy something really good. With regard to the first, you probably hope you drink it fast enough to skip the awful taste. With the latter, the whole drink becomes an enjoyable experience in and of itself. There’s nothing to regret, nothing to be ashamed of, no walk or crawl of shame.

When children see that their parents respect and enjoy sexual intimacy (please, I’m not talking about inviting the kids into the bedroom to gawk!), they start to see a context for it. They understand that there’s a situation for sex. When I was teaching high school, the biggest stumbling block for students to accepting that sex was something one should wait for until marriage was that their parents treated sex as something unmentionable, something dirty. Well, if it’s so base and dirty, why treasure sexual intimacy? Why wait?

In some ways, the Puritan types and the sexual libertines are as similar as the teetollaler and the alcoholic. All four consider the object of their obsession – sex or alcohol – as a drug. Try living sexual intimacy as an expression of love that is profoundly beautiful and unique and children might start to understand that sex, not unlike alcohol, has a context. We have many options for how to experience and enjoy both; but true enjoyment won’t come until we’ve got something/someone worth enjoying and we’re in the right place to enjoy that drink or in the right relationship to share that most intimate expression of love. That’s not to say we won’t slip up, but at least we’ll know we’re slipping up and we’ll know that there’s something better.

Moderation in all things…ultimately brings the greatest pleasure and satisfaction.

“Cheers!” “Salut” “Cin cin!” “Bottoms up!” “Skin off your nose, mud in your eye.” “Slainte.” …..you get the picture.