Clarity in the Morning

Clarity in the Morning

✍️ Author’s Note

This reflection began as a response to a simple prompt about favourite drinks. Yet simple questions rarely have simple answers. Over time, preferences change, not only in taste but in temperament. What once felt like indulgence becomes choice; what once seemed harmless reveals its limits. This is not a moral argument, but an observation — about proportion, freedom, and the quiet strength of remaining one’s own.

Letters to the Prompt

Dear Prompt,

You do have a gift for asking impossible questions. “What is your favourite drink?” sits comfortably beside “What is your favourite season?” and “What is your favourite movie?” — as if human beings operate like a vending machine: insert question, receive definitive answer.

By now you must have realised we are more complicated than that. I once wrote that I am a man of all seasons. The same applies to drinks — though, at my age, some seasons last shorter than others.

I have always preferred quality over quantity. A glass of Pol Roger Champagne on the right occasion. A good Bourgogne with dinner. An occasional Old Dutch jenever — perhaps a Bols Corenwyn — out of cultural loyalty. There have been evenings with The Macallan, or an after-dinner cognac such as Hennessy XO.

But the unromantic truth is this: life has its limits. The stronger beverages I now mostly reserve for an evening when I knowingly accept that I will wake up feeling the consequences of that mild transgression. An undisturbed night’s sleep and robust spirits are uneasy partners — particularly for an octogenarian.

In truth, I have probably drunk enough in my younger days to know that I can do without. Quantity was never the ambition — refinement was. The moment the glass becomes a necessity rather than a choice, something essential shifts.

I sometimes feel saddened when I see people of my generation who seem to need their daily fix — afternoon or evening — as if the ritual has quietly become dependence. And there is, in essence, little philosophical difference between alcohol and other substances; only the scale of consequences differs.

Cocaine, for example, can be devastating. I have seen highly capable and wealthy individuals lose not only their fortunes, but themselves — their personalities slowly splitting under its influence. It was offered to me more than once. It belonged to certain professional and social circles in which I moved. But it was never worth it. Perhaps I was simply too cautious — too aware that once something governs you, you are no longer entirely free.

It takes a certain strength to decline when a group assumes participation. But I was never afraid to walk alone.

Clarity in the morning is worth more than indulgence at night.

William J J Houtzager, June, 2026

📌 Blog Excerpt

What is your favourite drink? The question sounds innocent enough, as if human beings operate on a binary system. But taste, like life, moves in seasons. In youth, indulgence may seem effortless. With age, clarity becomes more valuable than excess. I have never feared declining a glass — nor walking alone when necessary.