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Old 12-29-2008, 02:02 PM   #24
C. David Henderson
Location: Santa Fe New Mexico
Join Date: Sep 2008
Posts: 606
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Re: How truly refreshing - Tohei K. on conflict resolution

Quote:
Matthew Gano wrote: View Post
Like the great Hunter Thompson said (a man who was an authority on "altered" states): you can turn your back on a person, but never on a drug...I presume certain mental disorders are much the same thing.
In the summer of 1981, I took a bus from Salem, OR, where the State Hospital is located, to Portland, where I was living at the time.

A man got on the bus who clearly seemed schizophrenic, and decompensating. He muttered to himself constantly, and appeared apprehensive.

The bus was the "milk run," and so had multiple stops. At each stop, the man would come up to the door, mutter, and when the increasingly nervous bus driver asked him if he wanted out, you could almost see the wheels in his mind going, "No, don't get off now, it's a trick."

Eventually we pulled into the station in Portland. The man who I thought likely was a recently released hospital patient had grown more restless as the trip progressed, but thankfully he didn't act out.

When we were leaving the bus, he stopped at the door, and began to mutter. I couldn't help but think my fellow traveler was saying to himself, "Oh no; this was the trick all along." I thought -- Everywhere he goes, there he is, waiting for himself.

Hadn't thought of that in a long time.

DH
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