Memoirs Volume 1: Liftoff

My friend started telling me about it in 9th grade. I was a "boarder," I stayed at school all the time- my parents weren’t from around there. It was cool, I loved it. We lived two to a room adjacent to the 18th hole of Spyglass golf course, which we used to make out with girls. My friend Jeremy was telling me all year, “you’ll see colors” “it’s like the encyclopedia is floating through your brain”--- hmmm. “Wow, that sounds cool; I’d like to try that. I don’t know if lesson after lesson on the adventures of Holden Caulfield are quite doing it for me” I replied. This was 1991. The day after school got out we saw Rage Against the Machine open for Pearl Jam at the Warfield in San Francisco. The next day we were on Haight Street near Stanyan, outside the McDonalds (pictured below), scoping the scene. A weird young indescribable kid with a cane took our order. A sheet. I think it was 70 dollars. Word made its way over to the gutter punks in the park, who were gathered in a circle. We went over and received our LSD wrapped tin foil, McDonald’s golden arches on each and every one. Kyon, our acid experienced guide was happy. We dosed.


Next thing I know, we are in the parking lot of Los Gatos shopping mall, sitting in the cab of a white truck. I was asked “Do you see now? You are going on all these different little trips” I saw. Every minuscule detail interested me so much that my FULL attention was paid to it. This would happen each instant, until the interests blended together into being completely immersed in a flowing mind voyage, experiencing multiple realities on many planes simultaneously. I remember losing the ability to converse and Jeremy trying to talk to me, unsuccessfully. “He’s gone, man” Kyon said. I was taken into the mall and into a cassette and CD store, Sam Goody or something like that. So far it had been a wonderful walk through the castle of consumerism; I marveled at people and was fascinated by paintings we walked by.

I think someone told me to pick out a tape. Or I saw one I liked. But either way, I put my finger into the tape rack. I wanted to touch the tape to signify it was the one I was verbally referring to but my finger slipped through the plastics and pushed on in. It came back out like elastic. This was a new sensation. I thought about it a lot before I was shuffled along. It is not often one can put their finger through solid objects.

On to Burger King. What a place! Things were getting unprovokingly contemplative- but I was together enough to talk to the lady who took my order. I tried eating a chicken sandwich and it just could not happen. Was I eating it now or was that 2 hours ago? Lucidity and time/space began to mingle in very confusing but marvelous way.

Someone gave me a piece of gum- Bubblelicious grape gum. Its flavor knows no limits. As Dr. John Lilly said- “In the province of the mind, what one believes to be true is true or becomes true, within certain limits to be found experientially and experimentally. These limits are further beliefs to be transcended. In the mind, there are no limits...”
I sat on the grass in front of Burger King for I what I carefully estimated to be 4 to 6 hours- chewing. Eventually I asked “how long has it been?”

Five minutes.

They couldn’t be serious. That makes no sense. Five fucking minutes?! Apparently, I had a time revelation (time doesn’t really exist). Like most things, it's all in your mind. This notion turned out to be an important tool in working towards developing an educated happiness or what some call Enlightenment or Nirvana.

Speaking of, Nirvana was on Saturday Night Live that night. Jeremy and I sat in the summer bedroom of his step mother’s home. The come-down was happening; the clarity was creeping in. It was beautiful. I stuck a bunch of the remaining acid in my wallet, eager to share it with my friends back in Los Angeles. I remember wondering why Kurt Cobain’s voice sounded so different, so raspy. I thought it was the acid but I later learned, as Courtney Love put it, they “got high and went to SNL”. They were on heroin and it makes your voice fucked up. What an amazing performance. Then, in classic psychedelic spirit, we watched the dancing broom part of Fantasia.