"Free soup! Get your free-hot-organic soup here!"

Imagine you are walking down the streets of San Francisco when suddenly you hear these words at about the same instant that the tantalizing smell of warm food fills your nostrils. You might not believe it; you might actually continue to walk down the street with not so much as a glance. A large part of the population either chooses not to believe it, or determines food scary and unworthy upon hearing the word free attached with it if it is being served street side. But maybe, just maybe, you pause, and the captivating chef spinning magic with a soup ladle spots the hesitation in your stride.

"You know you want some, uh huh..."

You turn, and walk closer towards a small cart where two portable burners are busy warming the undersides of a soup pot and a teakettle. A small crowd is gathered, and a tiny radio, duct taped to the cart, pumps tunes into the night. Ok, yes, you are curious now. You have just met Eric Bayer, the initiator and creator behind this event. He will invite you-- whether you are penniless, haven't showered in months and make the cement sidewalk your bed each night, or whether you are wearing designer duds and on your way to a 4 star restaurant, or really, if you are anyone at all who dares to look that direction-- to sit, and to enjoy some delicious food made from pure California produce and cooked with some healing intention he will share with you.

"So it's not exactly free," Eric might add as he rolls a burrito filled with maitake mushrooms and cheese and tosses it in a pan. What does he mean, you wonder, standing there, enjoying your good luck at finding this unique and unpredictable San Francisco happening, and indulging your curiosity.

"Yep, I lied," he says. "It's Food for Thought, and in exchange for this delicious food that I am preparing just for you, I invite you to open that book right there and find one of the ten cathartic prompts- or open-ended questions with no right or wrong answer-and you'll know what to do."

The book he points you towards is hand crafted from a colorful cut up produce box and laced with strips of old bicycle tubes. Your tentative fingers will slide a bamboo spear across the cover, causing it to spring open and reveal colorful pages. I know I'm in the right spot when... reads the prompt at the top of the first page.

So it's called Food for Thought. You can do it too. It's strange how something we all need- food, nourishment, health, community- has become such a commodity. Strange that how much money we have determines our diet, our health, and way of eating. It's somewhat puzzling that food, a medium with such power to nourish our bodies and souls and feed us in every way, is all too easily turned into a heavily packaged, shipped, lifeless form that we consume hurried, alone, and on the way from point A to point B.

At the end of a food for thought night perhaps fifty bowls of soup will have been served, and some street side community created as a number of interesting characters pull together over the simple act of eating. No doubt more than one person will ask, why are you doing this?

Hopefully throughout the evening someone will enjoy a meal who otherwise would not have that night. Perhaps the gathering of total strangers sharing food, stories and space in a potentially otherwise lonely evening, will warm some people. Maybe somebody will learn something new, and have the chance to express thoughts and feel listened to. And maybe the last bowl of soup will go to a pregnant woman on her way home from a minimum wage job to an empty refrigerator, a dying child, and the absence of a husband who has just been deported. This was the case the last time I ventured to the streets with Eric, and then I knew that I was in the right spot.