How I had come to live with Ted Morrow in a storage shed in Isla Vista California is an epic tale that I will save for another time, but suffice it to say, he was one of my closest friends. I mean, you would kind of have to be under the circumstances. He was a big black guy with a mowhawk, an easy smile and a off beat sense of humor. He was an extremely talented musician, playing congas mostly, but also tearing apart a bass from time to time. In fact, it was the band that he was in’s practice space, the shed, which we called home for a good six month stretch.

We had been through quite a bit considering the brief 2-3 years I knew him. The stories of shed life alone could fill some pages, but I will go you one better. Once he and I had been detained on suspicion of murder. I kid you not. Isla Vista is just north of Santa Barbara, adjacent to the UC school there. While I wouldn’t call it a sleepy town, it being the most densely populated square mile west of the Mississippi, I wouldn’t exactly call it crime ridden. The police blotter there reads more like minor in possession, public urination, property crime and maybe the occasional date rape thrown in for spice. So when an older couple were robbed and one was killed up the coast about a mile it was big big news. And what sensation.! The story had built itself in the press like this: Man and woman are sitting on the beach, enjoying the fresh pacific air, when they are approached by two men, one white, one black. White man says “Do you have any marijuana?”. When they said that they did not, black man draws a gun and shoots male in the head – killing him instantly. The suspects then fled the scene. See what I mean? Crazed drug addicts out of control, murder in broad daylight, this story had everything. It almost had us.
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