It could have been the 26th
I went on this trip in February of my senior year of college. It marked the end of a very weird time. The previous April a friend of mine had committed suicide. Then in October another good friend had died of an accidental drug over dose. That's all another story, but it's important to know how we all reacted to these deaths. There was no middle ground. Roughly half of us started binge drinking, and everyone else seemed to go dry for the rest of the year. I wasn't really involved in the event, but perhaps my doing CPR on my dead friend is relevant too. We'll see.
So my friend Darby who actually was involved in the drug overdose incident, invited me to go on a road trip. Our college squeezed in a six week 'Winter Session' before the Spring term started. It was actually a great time for the financially blessed kids to go abroad, but the best part was that it ended with a week long break near the end of February.
We drove from south western Idaho over to Portland to see my brother, then drove south along the coast in Darby's two seater Mazda MR2. We'd stop periodically at rest stops to sleep in the car; something that makes my back twitch just thinking about it. We made it as far south as Santa Barbara before we headed back north towards Oakland. You'd think I'd have more detail about a week long trip, but alas, it's not there.
We got to Oakland and decided to catch a Grateful Dead Show. I remember the surrealness of buying tickets in a parking lot from a guy who looked homeless. I learned the lighter trick to testing tickets. Put a flame under the ticket; a fake ticket will light up, but a real ticket will turn green then black.
We met up with some friends we had no idea were going to be there. How we managed that without cell phones is a mystery to me. I had no idea what to expect from a Dead show. Walking through shakedown alley was a trip all it's own. You walk down this crowded strip, people selling shirts and various hemp items along the way, while every human who passes seems to be whispering in your ear "shrooms... acid... kind...". All offers from young entrepreneurs. I felt a little high just walking through the crowd.
On the day I drove myself to college, my older brother gave me one last piece of advice. "Don't do anything I wouldn't do... twice." Somehow, my 18 year old brain twisted that into a policy of "I'll try anything once." I actually didn't get high much in college. This phase from October through February included my one time contact with Acid, Cocaine, and Mushrooms (mmm, mushrooms). Including the Dead show I can still count on one hand the times I smoked up. So I really wasn't prepared for the six foot bong our friends had in their van.
Before the fun began, the six of us we were sitting in the van when the guy who sold us the tickets walked up. "Wanna buy some acid?" He was holding a two inch square piece of notebook paper between his thumb and forefinger. Even I knew that 1) two inches square is a shit load of acid (64 tabs probably $320), and 2) anyone holding it between thumb and forefinger would end up high for a week. We declined the offer, but it made us a little more nervous about the tickets we had bought. We had actually only tested one of the two tickets, of course mine wasn't the one we checked.
So we come to the six foot bong. Why six feet you ask? Because a 12 foot bong won't fit in a VW microbus. I took my turn and sat back in the passenger's seat to await that giddy feeling I had experienced every other time I smoked pot. I have no idea how long I waited. Two minutes, an hour, I have no way of knowing. I just know I suddenly became aware of the spots on my hands. That was the only thing on my mind. Nothing else existed. I'd seen the spots before, but I couldn't remember when. I studied them. They didn't come off, so I deduced they weren't on my hands, but rather IN my hands.
That's right, I'm seeing the pores in my hand because my vision is intensified. But that only happened when I was on acid... Holy fucking shit!
At that moment the VW Microbus abruptly reappeared. "Where the hell am I?" my brain asked. I looked out the front window to find people walking by in front of the bus. And to my dismay some of them were actually looking at me.
Head down you idiot. Don't look at anyone. Okay, I can figure this out. Just stay calm and concentrate.
A quick glance at my hand reaffirmed that the spots were still there.
Okay, where am I? No, who am I? My name is... My name is... Okay, skip the name. Back to where am I.
Another glance out the window nearly killed me as two cops walked by.
I know where I am. I'm on a road trip with my friend Darby. Right, Darby. I wish he was here. Concentrate... there's got to be more. Brothers, I have two brothers. Don't know their names either. There has to be more... Grad School. that's right, I'm going to grad school. Or, maybe I just applied, but I'm sure I want to go to grad school, in... something.
That was it. all I knew about myself: I was on a road trip, I had two brothers, and I wanted to go to grad school.
"Sylow!"
"Mother fuck, where did you come from?"
"Huh?"
"How long have you been listening to me think?"
"You okay?"
"Why?... Why didn't you tell me?"
"Tell you what?"
"That it was laced."
"It's wasn't laced, it's just REALLY kind bud."
"I don't know who I am."
"You're Sylow."
"I know it when you say it, but when you're not saying it I can't remember it."
"You're Sylow. come on, it's time for the show."
If shakedown alley wasn't weird enough sober, it definitely plays with your head when you're high. Instead of everyone whispering their trade goods in my ear, I was hearing formulas, lemmas, and if-then statements. Right before we got to the ticket gate, I came to the realization that I had just proved Cayley's theorem in my head. "That's it", I shouted. "I'm going to grad school for math!"
Another glance at my hand showed me the spots had gone down to a finite number. A good sign, but I still had to get through the gate. I handed the ticket taker my illegally acquired admittance ticket. It was in the high seventies that day. Everyone was wearing shorts and a T-shirt. I had on jeans, a t-shirt, long sleeve shirt, flannel shirt, mexican hooded pull-over, a denim jacket, and I was still shivering. I was freezing, and the thoughts in my head were too loud for me to believe everyone wasn't tuned into my brainwaves... If only I had my tinfoil hat.
I know I got into the show, not from memory, but from a photo of me bundled up with the Grateful Dead in the background.
We left for home directly after the show. It was a very long drive back to Idaho. Sometime before the show ended my lucidness reached the perfect point to analyze the situation. My excessive behavior over the past four months was an attempt to hide from the most important question I would ever answer. Why am I not dead? Why do I get to live, when others do not. That six foot bong had boiled my brain down to the core of who I was that single day in my life. I had a friend, I had family I cared about, and I had a plan for my life. I will forever miss those friends who didn't make it. They matter, still. Their impact is not diminished by their absence. And most importantly, my life is no more or less valuable.
So my friend Darby who actually was involved in the drug overdose incident, invited me to go on a road trip. Our college squeezed in a six week 'Winter Session' before the Spring term started. It was actually a great time for the financially blessed kids to go abroad, but the best part was that it ended with a week long break near the end of February.
We drove from south western Idaho over to Portland to see my brother, then drove south along the coast in Darby's two seater Mazda MR2. We'd stop periodically at rest stops to sleep in the car; something that makes my back twitch just thinking about it. We made it as far south as Santa Barbara before we headed back north towards Oakland. You'd think I'd have more detail about a week long trip, but alas, it's not there.
We got to Oakland and decided to catch a Grateful Dead Show. I remember the surrealness of buying tickets in a parking lot from a guy who looked homeless. I learned the lighter trick to testing tickets. Put a flame under the ticket; a fake ticket will light up, but a real ticket will turn green then black.
We met up with some friends we had no idea were going to be there. How we managed that without cell phones is a mystery to me. I had no idea what to expect from a Dead show. Walking through shakedown alley was a trip all it's own. You walk down this crowded strip, people selling shirts and various hemp items along the way, while every human who passes seems to be whispering in your ear "shrooms... acid... kind...". All offers from young entrepreneurs. I felt a little high just walking through the crowd.
On the day I drove myself to college, my older brother gave me one last piece of advice. "Don't do anything I wouldn't do... twice." Somehow, my 18 year old brain twisted that into a policy of "I'll try anything once." I actually didn't get high much in college. This phase from October through February included my one time contact with Acid, Cocaine, and Mushrooms (mmm, mushrooms). Including the Dead show I can still count on one hand the times I smoked up. So I really wasn't prepared for the six foot bong our friends had in their van.
Before the fun began, the six of us we were sitting in the van when the guy who sold us the tickets walked up. "Wanna buy some acid?" He was holding a two inch square piece of notebook paper between his thumb and forefinger. Even I knew that 1) two inches square is a shit load of acid (64 tabs probably $320), and 2) anyone holding it between thumb and forefinger would end up high for a week. We declined the offer, but it made us a little more nervous about the tickets we had bought. We had actually only tested one of the two tickets, of course mine wasn't the one we checked.
So we come to the six foot bong. Why six feet you ask? Because a 12 foot bong won't fit in a VW microbus. I took my turn and sat back in the passenger's seat to await that giddy feeling I had experienced every other time I smoked pot. I have no idea how long I waited. Two minutes, an hour, I have no way of knowing. I just know I suddenly became aware of the spots on my hands. That was the only thing on my mind. Nothing else existed. I'd seen the spots before, but I couldn't remember when. I studied them. They didn't come off, so I deduced they weren't on my hands, but rather IN my hands.
That's right, I'm seeing the pores in my hand because my vision is intensified. But that only happened when I was on acid... Holy fucking shit!
At that moment the VW Microbus abruptly reappeared. "Where the hell am I?" my brain asked. I looked out the front window to find people walking by in front of the bus. And to my dismay some of them were actually looking at me.
Head down you idiot. Don't look at anyone. Okay, I can figure this out. Just stay calm and concentrate.
A quick glance at my hand reaffirmed that the spots were still there.
Okay, where am I? No, who am I? My name is... My name is... Okay, skip the name. Back to where am I.
Another glance out the window nearly killed me as two cops walked by.
I know where I am. I'm on a road trip with my friend Darby. Right, Darby. I wish he was here. Concentrate... there's got to be more. Brothers, I have two brothers. Don't know their names either. There has to be more... Grad School. that's right, I'm going to grad school. Or, maybe I just applied, but I'm sure I want to go to grad school, in... something.
That was it. all I knew about myself: I was on a road trip, I had two brothers, and I wanted to go to grad school.
"Sylow!"
"Mother fuck, where did you come from?"
"Huh?"
"How long have you been listening to me think?"
"You okay?"
"Why?... Why didn't you tell me?"
"Tell you what?"
"That it was laced."
"It's wasn't laced, it's just REALLY kind bud."
"I don't know who I am."
"You're Sylow."
"I know it when you say it, but when you're not saying it I can't remember it."
"You're Sylow. come on, it's time for the show."
If shakedown alley wasn't weird enough sober, it definitely plays with your head when you're high. Instead of everyone whispering their trade goods in my ear, I was hearing formulas, lemmas, and if-then statements. Right before we got to the ticket gate, I came to the realization that I had just proved Cayley's theorem in my head. "That's it", I shouted. "I'm going to grad school for math!"
Another glance at my hand showed me the spots had gone down to a finite number. A good sign, but I still had to get through the gate. I handed the ticket taker my illegally acquired admittance ticket. It was in the high seventies that day. Everyone was wearing shorts and a T-shirt. I had on jeans, a t-shirt, long sleeve shirt, flannel shirt, mexican hooded pull-over, a denim jacket, and I was still shivering. I was freezing, and the thoughts in my head were too loud for me to believe everyone wasn't tuned into my brainwaves... If only I had my tinfoil hat.
I know I got into the show, not from memory, but from a photo of me bundled up with the Grateful Dead in the background.
We left for home directly after the show. It was a very long drive back to Idaho. Sometime before the show ended my lucidness reached the perfect point to analyze the situation. My excessive behavior over the past four months was an attempt to hide from the most important question I would ever answer. Why am I not dead? Why do I get to live, when others do not. That six foot bong had boiled my brain down to the core of who I was that single day in my life. I had a friend, I had family I cared about, and I had a plan for my life. I will forever miss those friends who didn't make it. They matter, still. Their impact is not diminished by their absence. And most importantly, my life is no more or less valuable.
posted by Sylow_P | 8:33 PM
|
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