Confessions of a Gasoline Huffer
The article reflects on the author's experiences with Fran and Dana Handford, a retired couple living on Bainbridge Island. The author served as their gardener and was influenced by their eclectic library and unconventional lifestyle. A particular focus is on a book about inhalation psychosis that the author discovered, which detailed the lives of individuals who huffed gasoline and other substances.
- ▪Fran Handford was a retired schoolteacher who lived with her husband Dana on Bainbridge Island.
- ▪The author worked for the Handfords as a gardener and was encouraged to read from their extensive collection of books.
- ▪One book that particularly captivated the author was about inhalation psychosis, detailing the lives of individuals who huffed gasoline.
Opening excerpt (first ~120 words) tap to expand
Fran Handford was a retired schoolteacher who sat in a rocking chair, smoking long white cigarettes with shaky hands and listening to public radio. She and her husband Dana lived in the woods on Bainbridge Island, just down the road from my parents. Dana was tall and thin and drank a glass of buttermilk every day at lunch to keep his weight up. He saved his pee in a bucket by the back door to pour onto his compost pile. He was a psychiatrist and had been associated, in the 1950s, with the first American psychiatrists to study psychedelics. The Handfords had an impressionist landscape over the fireplace, by a friend of theirs.
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Excerpt limited to ~120 words for fair-use compliance. The full article is at The Stranger.
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