I am sitting at Townshend Tea House in downtown Bend this morning writing a bit, trying to pass the time. A couple of kids sitting next to me are playing chess. A little girl, restless in her wyas, sings out Our God is awesome...over and over again. She is fixing pillows and rocking a chair...I spect she is part of the God contingent here in Bend, which sings out front of Bellatazza Cafe...I will post a photo I shot of the God continegent later.

I woke up at 7 this morning and joined a group of about 50 runners at Phil's Trail for a 9-mile run. The run was part of a training group for the Dirty Half marathon in June. I took it slow, listening to my mind which knew this was an early part of my training, and my body, which couldn't go faster than 10 minute pace. It took me about an hour-forty minutes to complete the 9 mile run, about an 11 minute pace.

My body aches from the run, but my mind is lucid.

After the run, I went to Columbia Park off the river, laid down a towel, and read a chapter from An Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, by Tom Wolfe. It tells the story of Oregon-native Ken Kesey, who lived the dream of drug-induced psychosis. I remembered that lifestyle, which is so far distant from my current life.

I tasted it briefly during the summer after my freshman year in college. I went back to Danville and hung around with a couple of high school friends, smoking pot, doing a little LSD and working as a camp counselor in a day camp in Orinda, California.

My two friends would later live that life to its fullest extent in San Francisco. I would forever remain a prisoner of the suburbs.