Stylized line drawing of mark playing the flute

Not a wild child

I was easily scandalized as a kid.

I once freaked out at camp because I thought a kid in my cabin had cigarettes. It just turned out to be a box of raisins.

I seem to have a lot of stories of being freaked out by cigarettes. I turned down my first chance to smoke pot because they said I should smoke a cigarette first.

My grandma lived in McCloud, CA. We used to go up on weekends when I was in high school. My parents were helping her fix up the apartment attached to the front of her house.

I would bring my friend Russell and we’d bum around town while my parents worked. We played pool at the Legion Hall or wandered around the old mill.

My favorite was walking out to Soda Springs. I loved being out in the woods. It was so quiet and there were beaver dams if you walked out far enough.

Of course a lot of people went to Soda Springs to party. We always found empty liquor bottles and beer cans, the remnents of a bonfire.

But once we found an untouched six-pack of Miller High Life. It’s a testament to my innocence that it never occurred me to drink any of it.

Instead, Russell and I spent 10 minutes throwing the cans as high into the air as we could until they exploded.