For a while I have been terrified that my imagination is dead, or that I never had one in the first place.

And then last night I had a strange dream—it was a long, dark dream. I was there for many hours. I had made the mistake of eating a potent brownie that sent me on a bad voyage through my own head. About an hour into it I was sitting on 45th Street with my friend Laura, both of us twisted as hell and hating it, and I said to her: “When we feel OK again, we’ll really appreciate it. Because you always realize how nice it feels to be healthy when you’re sick.”

In my head I heard my own voice: “. . . but you’re going to be sick forever.” I tried to say “shut up” but my brain wouldn’t listen.

I went to every place there was to go inside my brain. I flew over it, and sometimes cut straight through it, and there were things in there I didn’t know existed. Some of it scared me because it was so dark (I think I met the Grim Reaper), but I was relieved to discover that my imagination isn’t dead. I saw enough to convince me that it wasn’t, anyway. Some of what I saw was beautiful.

I’m happy to be back. I thought for sure I had finally fried my brain. For God’s sake, I woke up on McCune’s kitchen floor. But I was OK, and I have some things to say now I think, and it’ll all come from my imagination. Lord! I love that thing. Maybe I just had to find it under all that crap I’ve been storing up there.