I pulled up to the speaker at Starbucks this morning. I am off work for four days so I had time to go get an overpriced, over sugared coffee. I asked for my usual order and the lady Chimed back in: "Do you want any special stuff in your coffee?"
"I don't think I want anyone's 'special stuff' in my coffee."
The lady laughed and explained (unnecessarily; this isn't my first time at a Starbucks, after all) that many people like to add sweet cream foam or extra shots to their drinks. I told her to go ahead and make it special by adding some caramel to it.
I am still noticing some after effects from my recent strong mushroom trips. I never liked the term "flashback" though. I remember these effects from when I was using psychedelics frequently in my youth. Every now and then, I'll notice mild tracers when something moves across my vision and shadows occasionally take a shallow breath or two when I gaze at them. The lingering effects are more noticeable after smoking a little weed and I find them to be somewhat pleasurable so I'm going to call it a win.
I'm still processing those two trips. I wish I could say I have dragged back some philosophical truth from deep inside the psychedelic realm but if I have, I haven't unpacked it yet. I mostly remember intensity, particularly in the last trip. I never categorized mushrooms as fun. They can be a great time but that is not the right way to look at them. They are, instead, eccentric and overwhelming.
Overwhelming is the right word for that last trip, too. It is difficult to remember a lot of that night, sadly. I know I was lying in bed sweating excessively for most of it. It was a psychically taxing experience but such is the price for traveling to such strange and exotic mindscapes. In that moment in time, I was truly in that moment. I could think of nothing besides the journey. I was surely capable of standing but I had neither the will or desire to do it. I was not myself either. I was simply a being experiencing an event of great significance and intensity.
At one point, it seemed like the façade that we perceive as the real world had dissolved and I was seeing the real reality underneath it. The car's hood was lifted and I was seeing the running engine that powers the vehicle. Little rings of different colors were overlaid on the world (or were visible beneath it) and were vibrating to give it substance and life, or so it seemed.
It took hours before I came back to reality, enough to emerge into the rest of the house. I was tripping hard but I was me again and back to the world we all know. I smoked a few bowls and watched the walls breath. At one point, the ceiling, being colored by the yellowy light bulb, looked like orange water.
After a bunch of CBD, I finally was able to fall asleep and I woke up feeling pretty good, despite the strength of the trip. I was and still am, however, bewildered by it. It feels like it has some meaning but I am struggling to decode what that is.
All the images in this post are taken from unsplash.com.
