On Madness
Chesterton, Twitter, Madness, and Bananas
I read this as I sat in the hospital lobby: "Effect of drugs: Impairs short-term memory and learning, affects coordination, reduces the ability to focus, increases the risk of psychosis in that vulnerable, decline in IQ when started in teen years." Instantly I thought, "This is apt. This describes Twitter." Then I praised myself for staying off this drug ("X" formerly called Twitter) for 12 hours or more. A very hard task. Considering that I am addicted to this digital drug, I thank Chesterton for motivating me to stay away from the drug. I want to share that motivation.
Since Thursday the world before my eyes began to be boring, bleak, and dull. Leading to a feverish madness. By Sunday the madness was climbing to such loud heights. I was frantic. Experiencing an unspoken and funny panic. I was laughing inside; laughing hard without shaking. I paced the room. I opened the drug and closed it. Opened it and closed it. Opened it and closed it one more time. Then I closed it and decided that because I was going mad it was important that I did not take the drug as it was exactly what I wanted or needed. That was Chesterton's advice on using Twitter: don't use it when you are mad or need it.
But then, G.K. Chesterton died 87 years ago. Twitter is 17 years old. How come?
Well, because Twitter is a drug and alcohol is a drug. What Chesterton recommended on how to use alcohol applies to how to use Twitter.
"Drink because you are happy, but never because you are miserable. Never drink when you are wretched without it, or you will be like the grey-faced gin-drinker in the slum; but drink when you would be happy without it, and you will be like the laughing peasant of Italy. Never drink because you need it, for this is rational drinking, and the way to death and hell. But drink because you do not need it, for this is irrational drinking, and the ancient health of the world."
G.K. Chesterton, Heretics.
Likewise, Tweet because you are happy, but never because you are miserable. Don't tweet when you are wretched and condemned to madness without it. Never tweet because you need it, for this is rational tweeting, and the way to death and hell. But Tweet because you do not need it, for this is irrational tweeting, and the future health of the world.
I should be back on X by the time you are reading this. You know what that means: the world is no longer boring, bleak, and dull. I have climbed down from the mountains of madness. All is well with the world again.
On madness, have you ever thought of bananas?
Sometimes I go to shower so that I can have time away from the business of the bedroom so that I might think freely about the man who coined the term "going bananas."
Of course, different theories exist as to why that metaphor came to life. One is that chimps went ape at the sight of bananas. Whatever. Another theory is that banana peels cause hallucinations. This is simply untrue. The third theory, mine, is that bananas taste so good that the closest sensation to it is insanity. Whatever the theory, I just want the guy who said it first.
Whatever that guy saw or knew, he clearly associated bananas with madness. The guy either thought bananas were so good that the only thing to describe them was madness, or bananas indeed make mad.
But who knows what that saying might inspire? It may someday inspire a young boy to study bananas. He might study them so well that he will chance upon the cure for cancer in bananas.
Perhaps he will get the Nobel prize. And he gives his prize speech before an ecstatic—because bananas—audience. But if that boy is anything like me, he will go home from that Nobel awards dinner looking like Boris Johnson—with ruffled hair and a haggard look with one half of his shirt untucked from his tuxedo. And when anyone asks him why he looks like an embattled prime minister, he will answer like this: "Now I know that bananas cure cancer. But I still don't know if bananas make mad."
The moral of this story: eat bananas slowly.
People like to call poets mad. Fortunately, I am not a poet; I have only written poetry. But Chesterton says it is not the poet who is mad. That it is the logician who gets mad. For the poet seeks to get his head into heaven while the logician seeks to fit heaven into his head. And it is his head that splits. Unfortunately, I was born a logician. And my head has been splitting since the day I started looking at the world. But that ends today.
I have decided to be a poet. Don't worry, I will not try to write poetry. If I do, I will try to write logical poems which are no poems at all. I just need the label. I want to avoid my predisposition to the logician's madness.
It is time instead to start putting my head—whole and unsplit—into the heavens. It is time to talk to the unicorns and the white rabbits. To learn the dance moves of the mad hatter and talk with Absalom.
I want to find the wonder in little things like bananas and cheese and tell the world why it is good and healthy to eat from a beautiful plate. To shave my hair. To wear fat trousers. Most importantly, I want to be able to sleep again.
Your meme: Marshall McLuhan from Universe-5462
Until next time.