DOSE:

1.7 g

oral

Mushrooms - P. cubensis

(dried)

BODY WEIGHT:

150 lb

I don’t know if the planets aligned that night, or if there really is something to the lemon extract tek. Either way, the result is indisputable. It remains the most confounding and terrifying night of my life. On March 2nd of this year (2011) it will mark the 3rd anniversary of that singular experience, and soon I will be taking mushrooms again. How humbling. In the interim I lived, breathed, and died a little each day. I spent six months in complete existential despair, but I also went on to pull off a 3.8 GPA for three consecutive semesters. And I’ve come closer than ever to figuring out just who I am and what I want to do with my time here on the green-blue gumball Earth.

What does it all amount to, the highs, the lows, the loathing, the confusion, and the stubborn clinging hope? I don’t know. What I do know is that I’m not through yet, not by a long shot. There are still more trips, more tears, and more trials ahead. But I will meet it all with the best I have inside of me. I will take mushrooms again because in my innermost being I love life more than anything. And what is life if not novelty? And what are shrooms if not one of the most novel expressions of life? And what have I to lose anyway?

What follows is true, the best that I can remember.

The digital clock on my computer says 10:50 pm. It’s now or never. I’ve got the remnants, basically half, of an eighth of Psilocybe cubensis. Well, not exactly. In fact, it is a little less than half, because it turns out the saintly soul who sold me the mushrooms not only charged me twice the usual amount, but also gave me three grams instead of three-point-five. He knew I was a newb, and probably figured I wouldn’t weight it out. It pays to know your shit folks.

Anyway, I’ve got class tomorrow morning, but I figure, what the hell? I’ve got nothing to lose by consuming this wimpy bag of shrooms. So I decide to potentiate them the best way that I can, and I pull out my bottle of lemon extract. First I chop the shrooms into a powder with my knife, then I dump the lumpy result into a tall glass. I pour the lemon extract in (don’t be stingy now!) and dilute it with water. Voila! One of the vilest looking concoctions I’ve seen. A shit-brown, piss-yellow cocktail that’s sure to result in a good time.

I give it ten minutes and at 11:00 I eagerly down the whole revolting, soggy mess. I chase it with water in between gulps, and before I know it, it’s gone! Now what? A very good question. In my meticulous planning, I had not thought past the actual consumption. Well, I guess it would be an excellent opportunity to enjoy The Fellowship of the Ring. So, I dig out the DVD and plop it in.

Before I press play, I decide to relieve my bladder. The time is 11:30 as I walk downstairs to the bathroom. Oh, I forgot to mention, all of this is in my parents’ house. And, yes, they’re sleeping in the room directly across from the bathroom, door closed as usual. What a daredevil shroom-fiend I am. Anyway, I close the door and go about my business. Looking over to the mirror, I can’t help but notice my eyes are dilated. A lot. “Hmm,” I think, “that’s odd, it didn’t come on this fast last time.”

I walk back up to my room to find the Fellowship DVD menu playing. It’s a loop that looks like water rippling over an artsy background of something like parchment paper. I take my seat on the couch and. . . proceed to watch the menu for the next ten minutes. The waves rock my senses gently and I breathe in, out, in, out, in, out. Then, vaguely, I remember that it might be even better if I press play.

Wow! There it is! The Shire, in all its rural and rustic glory. And it’s moving! A three-dimensional diorama recessed in the hollow of my TV! Frodo, cel-shaded and cartoony, greets Gandalf, his face pulsing with miasmic red plasma. Then we meet Bilbo, and his skin is the texture of a weathered tree-stump. What a wacky world I’ve stumbled into! The movie absorbs me completely. At some point I pause to examine my hand. It seems to have a mind of its own. My mouth utters alien syllables as my hand ungulates from side to side. I chuckle helplessly. Is this all shrooms are?

Back to the movie. Now the hobbits have come to Weathertop, and the Ringwraiths are closing in. I notice what appear to be Mayan glyphs circling the television ominously. Something inside me is brewing. And it’s the need to urinate, again. So I press pause and walk downstairs.

To my horror, I see the door to my parents’ room ajar. Panic! Quick, hide in the bathroom! They know! They know! I breathe quickly, assessing the situation. Gingerly, I open the door and look. No movement from within. Moments pass and still nothing. I realize they must be sleeping with the door open, something they never, ever do.

As I relieve myself I am relieved. But something fundamental has changed about the trip. A dark current is picking up strength. There are undertones of paranoia now. I walk back to my room and sit down on the couch. Suddenly, I realize that I’m sitting in the exact same position I was last time I tripped on mushrooms. What if all the time between now and then has been a hallucination?

Soon it’s no longer a hypothetical question, but reality! To my uttermost confusion and terror, I find myself in two places at once! I am sitting with my friend two weeks earlier, but I am also sitting alone in the present time. Before I know it, I’m in three places at once, as I’m also lying on my bed looking up at the ceiling. What the hell is going on?! Now four places at once! Now five! And on, and on, and on.

Every moment I’ve ever experienced, every feeling I’ve ever felt is suddenly present, all simultaneously. My mind reels in the madness, and I feel my sense of self slipping. Time dissolves, space dissolves, everything dissolves, until even the last gooey residue of reality is gone. Where I am now is beyond time, space, and any familiar dimension that can be described.

I see now that I am more than just me. Deep down, I am subtly connected to each and every being that has ever lived or will ever live. And they’re all here, now. What I am some would call God, or the Universal Mind. I value each and every memory that is contributed by each and every living thing, especially the trippers. Yes, the most honored of all are those explorers of consciousness who dare to discover the edges of experience.

But all that is over now. The game has ended, and it’s just me, as it’s always been. Eons pass, swallowed by vast swaths of time greater than that from the Big Bang to the atom bomb. Or maybe no time at all. It’s impossible to say. That there had ever been something called reality is quickly forgotten.

At some point, a strange thing begins to happen. Scenes and flashes from someone’s life begin appearing before me. There he is, sitting on the floor in his parents’ house. What are parents? I can’t remember, but it seems like something I should probably know. Slowly, painfully, I realize that he was once me. How? How can I be this strange, pale young man sprawled out on the ocean floor of time? But I am. Soon I see through his eyes, and I see everything in his past and future. It feels like the most illusory thing in the world. Like a house built of gossamer threads suspended over the gaping gulf of eternity.

He is frantic now. He is lying on his bed, trying to pull his sweater from his back. It comes off in thick, gooey strands and melts to the floor. At the same time he is also sitting on the couch, hand in mouth, staring wildly around the room. He is trying to remember a life, a house, that was built on foundations of sand. Every time he tries to grasp at the memories they slip through his hands. Was it all for nothing? Had it all been a meaningless dream?

And then I’m him. The walls of time and space fold back over the yawning mouth of eternity, and I find myself under a roof and staring out the window of a once-familiar room. I pull out my journal, trying to find some semblance of sanity in this maze of unmitigated madness. I write, “I made a conscious decision to be mortal, to live and to die, because the alternative is intolerable.” But then the ink melts off the page! I throw the journal down and pick up my iPod. Maybe if I check the time I can find something, anything real to hold on to. The clock reads 2:55, but the seconds have stopped moving.

Pay no attention! Quick, put on some music! Something upbeat, anything. My shaking fingers somehow manage to pick out “Jessica” by The Allman Brothers Band. The piano bounces and shimmers and the drums dance down into my ears, pull me out of my dizzying descent to delirium, and lift me back up to familiar reality. And, just like that, I’m back. I check the time and it’s 3:00, the seconds moving along smoothly now. I look out the window and everything is snow-covered and serene.

“Holy shit! Holy shit! Holy shit!” This is my new mantra. I sit in bed, repeating it over and over religiously. I never knew anything like this could happen, why didn’t anyone ever warn me? “Hey, watch out with those mushrooms, the universe might cave in!” I don’t know what to make of it all. What am I to do with my life now I’ve seen that it’s only the tiniest fraction of the smallest grain of sand at the bottom of a vast and endless ocean?

I wake up the next morning and walk outside. As if by magic, winter’s cold grip has lifted. A warm, welcoming breeze blows past me as I stand among the melting rivulets of snow. I look up and see beautiful white clouds dotting the azure sky. A gull cries and I watch a flock of them float by in the airy vapors high above the trees. I take a deep breath and, for the moment at least, feel deeply and totally at peace.

Now it is nearly three years later, February 12th, 2011 to be exact. I sit here typing this report with a quarter of mushrooms sitting in a bottle beside my computer. I know that soon, perhaps even on the anniversary itself, I will be sailing the open seas of eternity once again. This time, however, things will be different. Vastly different. It would be the height of arrogance and stupidity to repeat the same mistakes I made the last time I voyaged with mushrooms. My respect and humility are boundless, and I intend to take them the way they should be taken, outdoors and in as beautiful a natural setting as can be found. For, if you take anything away from this report at all, I hope it is that the mushrooms are an insanely powerful tool. Whether that tool takes the shape of a wrecking ball or a kind and gentle hand is between you and the shrooms. Safe journeys, and good luck!

Exp Year: 2010	ExpID: 89627
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: 18
Published: Jan 22, 2014	Views: 4,124
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Mushrooms - P. cubensis (66) : Alone (16), Difficult Experiences (5)