Author: Spencer Parsons

Spencer Parsons hopes one day to return to that Sunoco where he ate toadstools, off the westbound side of 1-64, to the north of Hurricane, West Virginia, in the summer of 1977. Like many Americans, he often dreams of abduction by space aliens for medical experiments, but he will insist these are encoded memories of having his stomach pumped after the meal, since that's not a part of the experience he can recall directly. Nevertheless, he very clearly remembers his mother's screams and his father's announcements of the medical emergency over the family's CB radio while pressing their overheating Chevy Vega to exceed all speed limits on the way to the nearest hospital. Most of all, he remembers how gasoline fumes mixed with dirt and funk and the toadstools' vulgar umami, as he ate one after another in those brief moments before his parents caught on. He remembers it was delicious.