Van Zandt is one of those puzzles without answer to me. On the one hand, people like that seem bent on destroying themselves; on the other hand, had they not gone into music, for instance, maybe they would have destroyed themselves much earlier.

Buddy Tabor, a talented songwriter in his own right, brought Townes VZ to Juneau a couple of years before he died. His 'handlers' hewed to a fine balance between 'enough' and 'too much', even on stage.

Maybe it is kind of like what happened in literature. There was a time - I hope it is over - when upcoming writers seemed to think they had to live a hard life in order to be taken seriously even by themselves.