Drugs

When I was in my late teens and early twenties, I did drugs. A lot of drugs. I did marijuana (the status of this one as a "drug" remains up for discussion), cocaine, LSD, methamphetamines, and whatever else I could get my hands on. Whether or not all of this contributed to my current bipolar condition or to my depression, I really can not say. It would be interesting to find out though.

At any rate, I have a lot of memories from those drug induced days, some of which are scary to look back upon, and some that are kind of funny. I remember dropping acid during the first day of my senior year in high school. The acid trip peaked out during second period, midway through my English Composition class. The instructor gave us a written test on that day, and I remember sitting there in class, staring at the writing on the test paper that was handed out, and watching the printed letters turn into rainbow colored caterpillars that would move around and make cool designs on that page. The experience of this acid trip was so enthralling, I did it again several times during that school year. I deliberately timed my acid trips so that they would peak out while I was in that class.

As you might have guessed, I did not receive a very good grade in that class. But, despite that, I feel that I have turned into a decent writer. Or, maybe not. Who cares, anyway?

Not all of my experiences taking drugs were so colorful though. In retrospect, some were very frightening, to the point that I sometimes wonder how I lived thru them. When I was 23 years old, there were a few months when my drug of choice was something known as "blue shoot." My friend, Jeff, and I first learned about blue shoot from the movie "Drugstore Cowboy" - a great movie inspired by a novel by James Fogle. After watching this movie, we quickly learned that there are several different types of blue shoot, and we decided to try at least one of them.

The blue shoot that we did was based on a combination antihistamine tablet, the exact name of which I do not remember anymore. We would put the tablet into an ordinary table spoon, add water, and light a fire under the spoon so that the water would boil and the tablet would desolve. Then we would use a cotton ball to filter the liquid while we aspirated it into a syringe. The finished result would be a syringe full of clear, bluish colored fluid, "blue shoot," that we would inject directly into our veins.
The effect of blue shoot was nearly indescribable. It was a warm, subtle feeling of numbness that started in the spine, before spreading out to the whole body. It only lasted for about an hour, but for that hour, every worry in the world ceased to exist.

Before reaching this pleasureful phase, however, you had to survive the initial shock of the drug. This was the frightening part. Jeff and I used to tell each other that if one of us died while doing blue shoot, the other could tell everyone that him or I was found that way. That way, neither of us would have to live with a guilty conscious. Once the drug was injected into your vein, breathing became very difficult.
Your chest would become heavy, a crushing feeling would set in, causing you to gasp for air.

To be continued...