Ken Kesey's Spiritual Universe

I don't need to remind you how cool Terri Gross is. But you might need some prodding to remember how cool Ken Kesey is, you know, how he's no mere leftover crispy critter from the Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test. In this brief 1989 interview on Gross's Fresh Air, Kesey says a bunch of really unique things, so check it out. I really like what he says about his first acid trip (sponsored, yes, by the CIA).

"We suddenly realized that there's a lot more to this world than we previously thought. I think, you know -- because I'm asked this question a lot. Its been 20 years or so, and people are always coming back and saying well, what do you think? And I'm -- one of the things that I think came out of it is this, is that there's room. We don't all have to be the same. We don't have to have Baptists coast to coast. We can throw in some Buddhists and some Christians, and people who are just thinking these totally strange thoughts about the Irish leprechauns -- that there is room, spiritually, for everybody in this universe."

That last bit about the leprechauns is key. That's not just rhetoric. For all I know, the local nut job over there across the street might be making more of a contribution cosmically-speaking than I am with all my respect- and achievement-oriented obsessions. Let me just toss in another acid insight. I was just reading a terrific interview with Kesey’s compadre Jerry Garcia from the 90s, not long before his death, and they asked him if he had one takeaway from all his acid trips. And he said he did indeed, which is that if he had never taken LSD he would have spent his whole life laboring under the delusion that this material world is all that there is.