DOSE:

5 caps

oral

Mushrooms

(fresh)

BODY WEIGHT:

130 lb

During Hurricane Andrew my boyfriend managed to steal time away from work in Central Florida to go and pick some mushrooms near the coast. He came home with a huge cooler full of them. That August, I was turning 30. And we had planned just a small party, the two of us alone. The following week his friends who were allegedly more experienced trippers were coming for a visit from Georgia. But for now? It was my birthday party.

I had a ten year old daughter at the time and we made preparations by leaving her with a friend of mine, who knew what we were up to. In exchange for a plentiful supply for herself, she agreed to keep my daughter overnight and let us take our little vacation.

My boyfriend was really into the spiritual aspects of the trip, while I was more into the recreational aspects of it. Years before I'd had my first trip, and it was very spiritual. I've believed in God ever since. Whatever the case, we were so obviously on two different planes for this trip. He ate more than I did, and he chewed them whole. I put them into vegetable soup.

Shortly after taking them, I recall starting to get off. And I had the same reaction I did every time I tripped: OH NO! I don't want to do this. This always happens to me and I always end the trip the same way: OH NO! I don't want to come down!

I got bad case of stomach upset from these mushrooms and I spent the first part of the trip in the bathroom on the john. That's where the hallucinations started. Funny, I didn't seem to mind the gastrointestinal upset; it was the geometric pattern on the floor tile that had my attention. It was really fascinating, moving around and around, changing patterns, etc. I could not have cared less about what my intestines were doing.

Afterward, wondering where he was, I wandered into my bedroom, heard the shower running and opened the door. We were always very open with each other like that so I was quite surprised by his bellowing reaction: DON'T YOU KNOCK??? He then told me he was having a spiritual experience and wanted to be left alone in the shower. That was fine with me, and although I was very high at this point, I do recall thinking he had bad manners. But I didn't let it bother me. In fact, I couldn't let it bother me. I had too much joy and laughter to discover to let his bad mood/trip get in the way of mine.

When he finished in the shower, we decided to walk outside. At one point, one of us brought up that we'd read soemthing about the teenagers in Florida licking poisonous toads to get high. I remember him taking it all very personally, insisting he had NEVER licked a toad! It was around this time that I felt I had to hide my laughter from him. At one point, near a pond, we got down on our hands and knees to listen to the frogs more clearly and it was like symphony. Again for me, it was more entertaining, while for him it was much more serious, with serious admonitions made to me about my attitude being too irreverant. I thought it was all absurd, since it was my birthday . . . and hey, I'll laugh if I want to, right? Everything was absurd to me that night. That was my theme: absurdity and lightness of being. His was so serious.

Later on, probably about two hours into the trip, we got back home and put on the movie Fantasia, which I still love to this day because of the experience. Again, for him it was all very serious and important; to me? It was all very wonderful and amusing and lighthearted. He got upset at Mickey Mouse for his scorcery and at this point I remember actually hiding behind the sofa so that he couldnt' see how hard I was laughing at both him and Mickey Mouse. I foudn the music incredibly beautiful, moving, like I could feel every note, but I was never tempted to feel heavy, serious, or anything like that. It was nothing but pleasant. And delightfully absurd.

I was also enjoying the sense that life did not ever have to be so serious, that taking it all wiht a grain of salt and seeing the absurdity of it all was the key. I also recall the narrator talking about the experience of the 'profane vs the profound,' something like that, and felt it was a perfect explanation for what was going on between the two of us. I was profane; he was profound. We were definitely not connecting at all, but were more like roomates on a trip together. He was annoyed by me, and I was amused by his annoyance.

And eventually I felt the sadness of coming down, realizing it was coming to an end. The temptation to eat more was intense, but it was late and I was also concerned about more stomach upset. So we went to bed and surprisingly enough, slept really well. The next day we called my friend, talked to my daughter and were assured that all was well there. And then we headed off to the pier for some lunch and to the art museum, where August Rodin's work was on display. Now THIS was incredible. The high had not gone away, as I'd thought before we went to bed. When we got into the museum, the artwork, ALL of it was just astonishing in its beauty and relevance. And finally we started to communicate on the same level. Whereas the night before I think we'd both felt superior to the other, we were now very respectful of each other.

We took a seat in the garden and just gazed at the ironwork, the plants and the beautiful Florida sky. It was a most lovely, glowing, warm and communal human connection to all around us and within us and between us. And very, very mellow, whereas the night before had been so intense. In retrospect, I think this was the best part of the trip. We had such peace and beauty together the next day. Later we went and ate and ate and ate and ate. All Italian food and it felt great, like we were watering drought-stricken fields.

The following week his friends arrived. I had never met them before and was warned that they might 'judge' me. This was something I was not pleased with. This was MY life and if they wanted to be super serious, take themselves so seriously, I really wasnt' all that interested in them. And when I got to his place, a really cool, incredible part of Florida that the tourists don't know about I was set to just be myself. This was MY home. This was MY territory and I knew it well, loved it well and these mushrooms were the product of the horrible storms we Floridians lived with year after year. If they were out to prove their superior coolness over me, I wasn't interested in playing the game. They were here asking for OUR stash.

The wife of the pair turned out to be the problem. Being landlocked in North Georgia, she was bound and determined to go tripping at the beach, which was closer to my house, about 70 miles away. She had to go to a certain beach, against our warnings. This particular beach is actually 'rationed'; you can only stay for a certain number of hours. You can only get there by boat. We had a perfectly fascinating place to trip at my boyfriend's place, all surrounded by water on a small island. The plants nad trees were incredible and we'd have no problem being left alone as it was quite isolated.

The wife's complaints started as soon as the day began. It's too hot she said. Well, it's Florida in August, what did you expect? We made the long and frustrating drive to the beach she had chosen and when we got there, I decided I couldn't trip at that time. I was still leery of the stomach upset and I just didn't feel comfortable with these people at all.

They tripped, all of them, except for me. And this was the first time I'd been the sober one around a group that was tripping. The wife was apparently very insecure and this really fouled up her experience. She was upset that no one wanted to eat the food she'd brought. She was upset that her husband was out tripping, body surfing the gorgeous Gulf waters while she was afraid of the water, she was just plain upset. And when she started talking baby-talk, I had to leave. I went for a long, long walk on the beach by myself, content with reliving my own mushroom high from the week before.

When the beach guards let us know that we had to leave, she panicked. This was what we'd warned her about. You just don't go tripping on the beach, in that intense sunshine and heat and pack up after three hours and expect everything to be fine. She was horribly upset and paranoid.

That night, she pouted in her tripping head, insisting on sitting outside, under the moon by the water, getting eaten up by mosquitos. My boyfriend and his friend and I stayed inside and had a perfectly great evening, laughing and smoking a little weed.

THe weekend ended on a terrible note. She was just plain angry the next day when they left. And I knew from my experience with these same mushrooms the week before that she had to still be feeling the afterflow, so I foudn it so difficult to imagine the depths of her misery. How could she be so miserable?

We kept these dried mushrooms until just a few years ago. The last time I did any was the xmas season of 1996, with my oldest and best female friend. My boyfriend was visiting family and my daughter was again, with friends. We ate some dried mushrooms and sat and chattered the night away, lying under the Christmas tree, mesmerized by the chaser lights and by Zappa's Yellow Shark album. IT was a really light buzz. I don't know if that's because we used less or because they were dried and maybe had lost some of their potency or just because we're really casual and accepting of each other. But it was such a warm, easy feeling, surfing the music and the lights with her that night. And yes, when I started to come down, all I could think was OH NO! I don't want to come down yet.

And taht was the end of the Hurricane Andrew mushrooms for me. I have felt somewhat guilty at times thinking of the suffering those on the east coast of Florida felt due to that storm, while we, on the west coast took advantage of the bountiful harvest of mushrooms to trip. But I had no malice and I don't have any regrets about it now.

What I did learn was that people react differently to mushrooms, and the best way to cope is to just do your own thing. The best scenario, of course, is to be with someone you totally trust and feel at ease with, like I did with my friend under the Christmas tree, or the day I spent at the museum with my boyfriend. But then again, the night before, he was thoroughly annoyed with me. For this reason, I've never tripped with him again. Altough my fortieth birthday is coming up very soon and my daughter is now grown and his friends are not coming to visit and I may just be tempted to try it again. I love mushrooms, although I have to say that they are not for every day or every week, or every year. I really think it's somethign best left alone to contemplate and only very occaisionally enjoy. And by all means, try to make sure that you're in the company of people whom you trust and like. But even that doesn't assure one of compatibility while tripping.

All in all? I'd do it again. And as I said, I've got another milestone birthday coming up. Might be time to pray for rain. But please God, no Hurricane Andrew. That's more than we want or need.

Exp Year: 1992	ExpID: 16504
Gender: Female
Age at time of experience: Not Given
Published: May 31, 2007	Views: 5,612
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