GROOVING

If I do something well, I want to know if it's because of what I've done and what I've worked for. I want to just have a natural high. I can hug people with with while I'm straight and feel love. Somehow or other we ended up tripping together. A beautiful feeling of unity. Just really nice. I'd like to do that again. I don't smoke I don't those are acid or anything like that, but I'd say a goodly percentage of my friends do. And so I get into contact with them. Why aren't you into drugs at all? Well, I've just never felt the need or the desire to I don't particularly need it to make my life complete. I didn't think it would do anything particular for me and I'm happy to take things naturally. I feel I can look to myself more than I'd rather look to myself than to look towards a drug or something that's lacking in my personality. Well, I became acquainted with marijuana because my brother used to smoke it about 5 years ago or something like that. Before I think it was before everyone else started to before it became really popular. I was about uh 13 then. I didn't smoke very often at all like about once every 3 months or so at at an L Y meeting. That was a church meeting kind of thing. And uh then about 2 years ago uh I started smoking more often. And uh then uh around April I think it was uh somebody turned me on to acid and I've been tripping that I tripped about mm I think I've tripped about eight times since then something like that. Mescaline, too. And um I had I tried I tried heroin about a week ago. And what else? I haven't One thing I've never had is any I've never had any down pills, you know, Tuinals or anything like that. And I I've had speed, but only a couple of times and What's it like heroin? Well, it was very pleasant. It was very nice. A lot of people said that they think that they get sick from it and I didn't get sick from it, so I thought it was I had a very nice, you know, experience with it, but that's about as far as it goes. orally? Did you swallow it or did you shoot it? Oh, shot it. Did you skin pop or did you main line? Mained it. First time? Mhm. When you first started smoking 5 years ago did you ever think, you know, that you'd be shooting heroin and tripping and things like that? Or did you just think that you'd be starting out and well, I'll just smoke and then maybe try something else, but leave it at that not do much more? The way I thought when I when I first started getting into smoking was that I'd like to see what what all of it was like and be able to uh things that were bad and take out the things that were good. And uh See, I think that I'm the type of person who can't take other people's advice about anything. I have to experience I have to learn lessons by experience experiencing things myself. And like that's probably why I uh decided to to shoot junk because I wanted to I knew very well that there's nothing there's nothing to it. There's there's really it's absolutely a waste, but I had to do it myself to be able to say all right, it's really a waste. But I think that marijuana should be a part of some people's lives. Marijuana uh it's made me see the uh see what's important about living and what isn't important about living. What is? What is important about living? Well, uh being happy, being able to love. Love in what way? Love in what way? Love in what way? Love love everything. Not not hate anything. In other words, that all the time that every time that you smoke pot you think about these things. I don't believe you find that. You don't think I would? I don't think so. Why? Why? I don't think that that that well, for because I don't think you can learn it that way. I smoked pot for 2 years and I don't think you learn it that way. I've I've figured that that well, I've I've learned that you don't learn it that way. When I was off pot. Did you have See and I and I look see I know, man, that smoking pot all that happens is you get high, the people get high, you sit around and goof, you listen to country gentlemen fishing groove. That's all you ever do. You never you never sit there and and say, "Well, man, people is you know, life is great. I'm learning how to love now and I mean I mean, come on. Be realistic, okay?" The thing is I think you would have been concerned about loving and living and having a good life and learning about people whether you would smoke or not. Perhaps when you smoke you find it easier to rap on and on and but it doesn't it doesn't matter. All it does is get you high and then and then it wears off. That's all it does. Well, if I was in a place where there weren't any drugs at all, I would be just as happy as I am now. But since they're around and I enjoy do I enjoy taking them. I I you know, I like them. I I would probably keep on using some of them. Could you stop? Could I stop? Yeah. Yes, I could very easily. Why don't you? Because they're available. Wait, if if you're taking the risk of getting busted, if you're taking the risk of ODing and dying, is that reason enough to stop? And if not, what is? It's a really difficult question. I I don't like to think about all the risks I'm taking very often. I bet you don't. And uh I wouldn't either. The time when I would stop is if I thought that it was uh getting me into a situation where I needed to get high to have a good time or to to be happy. And If the drug was starting to control me. You start out and it's a small segment of your life. It's something new and something interesting. And they enjoy it and they go on. And they do drugs more and more and it becomes to the point where you don't just say, "Well, let's go off and do something." It's always let's go off and smoke. Let's go off and drop some acid. Yeah, let's go do some ups and downs. Until the point is you sort of it becomes like first position in your social sphere. That's the point at which I think I would stop if I became that dependent on it and it became that much that important to me to do some to do drugs. I don't think you would stop. You don't think I would? This isn't even a case of dependence. Hasn't that point come? No, I don't think so. No. It's not part of your life? Part of my life? It's it's uh it's like it's like an addition to my life, it's not really part of it. But well, You wouldn't have to say that. I couldn't say Yeah, that's right. I couldn't say that it's not a part of my life. So you've reached that point already. It's just it's become so much a part of you that you don't even notice it. Like getting up and brushing your teeth or something. I just realized it and I haven't I haven't thought about it that way before, but you've made me aware that it's sort of like it's sort of creeping up on me like that way. And becoming more and more important taking on more and more importance. Yeah. So what about that? Well, I think that is something too that's, you know, definitely should be looked into. I should do something about that. Yeah. Because, you know, that's that's the only thing that uh I'm wary about drugs. That's the only thing that I think uh that's the only reason that I would uh stop. That's the only reason? When it starts to take over. I'm entirely straight. Entirely. I've never smoked I have a lot of friends that smoke. I have a lot of friends that grass, hash, some speeds and THC, some mescaline. You've been absolutely straight. How does that make you you all feel? That's really nice, you know. It's like like like he's saying well, I don't really need this this crap, you know. I don't know like the attitude of somebody who says, you know, I'm I'm I can't explain it. It's a really strange thing, but like somehow it seems more natural to me to at least experiment with drugs than to never have. It seems like you're afraid of the experience and you won't do it. I think you're saying not because of any real reason like that your parents have instilled strong moral values in you or because you figured just not a sensible thing to do, but that you're really frightened of it. I made a decision because of a couple of bad things I saw. Like really bad things and things that were very disturbing to me. what's that? Well, two things. Number one, I saw a guy who had been smoking every day for like 5 years. And and this is in addition to to tripping and speed and mescaline and this guy who was a a really good music student. He was going to music and art. He was very good and is now kind of a marshmallow. He walks around in a permanent daze and it he gets coherent once in a while, but it's it's a disturbing thing to see someone you know go straight to hell. And I made a decision that I wasn't really a strong enough person to probably do without it all my life, but I forced myself, you know, to just do without it. In other words, I I worked myself out of of whatever I was in and I just made a decision that I didn't want to smoke. I respect somebody who realizes that there's a danger involved that they might really get messed up and doesn't want to and says, "Okay, I'm not going to do it. I'm going to hold off as long as I can. Maybe eventually I'll end up smoking and trying it, but I'm going to put it off as long as I can." I think in my opinion, I know I won't go on drugs now because I've been through enough things that I know that however bad anything is may seem at the time, it's going to pass and I never felt that that I wasn't going to survive, so I had to escape from a situation. A lot of people who get into drugs do it because like this is a really interesting point. I was reading in um The Art of Loving by Erich Fromm and he says that people people are feel alone in life and they feel separate and you can overcome this by you know, person-to-person contact, but a lot of people aren't able to do this and so they try and overcome the separateness by going to drugs. And so somebody who's confused and lonely doesn't have a sense of identity can get into drugs for a sense of importance. You know, the thing that's wrong with the grown-ups nowadays, come to think about them, is that they they when somebody takes pot, snort, whatever they want to take, the grown-ups saying they're just trying to find a way out. You know, you you feel free. You feel, you know, like your mind is free. There's nothing tight in your mind that you're thinking about. You feel real happy, you know. That's the way I feel about it. Like people say, "Oh, you're doing this for an escape." You know, it's like, "Why do you like chocolate candy?" Cuz you dig it, right? Well, I like getting high. I told them I'm not trying to find an escape. I just enjoy it. You know, you just want to feel free. That's that's a way of feeling free. I think everybody would have to agree. Because when you're drunk, you have no problem. How about when you're not drunk? When you're sober, you have lots of problems. Why people start is to escape reality and I find myself I can face my own problems pretty well without having to resort to anything else to, you know, help me um I can dig drugs and people don't dig it. Not naturally, but they something I think something's wrong with them. I'm so I can egotist myself. But I'd like to say to myself there's nothing wrong. But you don't dig people who don't get high. I know, I don't I didn't say that. Who's to say I put them down a step? Who's to say I don't want to turn on? Why? I mean, why do you do that? I'm interested in why you react that way. I don't know. I really can't tell you. I think you do. Could I ask him a question? Go ahead. You like Chinese food. Yeah. I don't like it. Would you put me a step down because I didn't like it? Go ahead. That's why I say I I can't analyze why I do not know, all right man. I like believe me, I don't know. You got to be hiding something because if if you like Chinese food and I don't like it, I got to be lower than you, man. All right. All right. I think it may be a feeling that I am cool and hip because I take drugs. And that these people aren't. How about that? So a person who does take drugs, the only reason he's not hip is because he doesn't take drugs. No, wait. You're putting words in my mouth. I'm saying I put them on a a lower scale. They they have to prove to me that like They're equal to you. Yeah. Should you ask yourself this question? Who are you to be proved to? But I think in nine out of 10 cases that any younger kid, let's say below 16, who says to himself, "I can do it infrequently and control myself and still run my life the way I want to." is just kidding himself. Yeah, that's it. It turns out the only way he wants to is to get stoned. Yeah, that's really cool. What happened is your aim shift. Like they say um you know, I can control it and then once they're getting stoned on grass a lot, they figure why bother to control it. I'm I'd like to try something else. Like it's I think it's pretty well people don't think anymore that if you start on grass, you're going to automatically end up shooting smack, you know, that's kind of discounted now. Like that isn't true that it happens in every case, but it is true that after a while you've gotten stoned enough so that it's a boring high on grass, you're really curious and you and you want to try something new. Yeah. Anybody who starts smoke after a while really gets into it. But I'm not sure at a certain point when you start to smoke, then it really starts affecting you. No, I didn't do it that way. When you start you know, using it when you're feeling bad to make yourself feel good and then when you're having a good time to enjoy yourself more. More, yeah. When it gets to that point, then it really starts affecting you. And when it got to that point, that's where my motivation started to fall away and my interest in things started to As it was falling, did you know it was falling? Did you realize it was happening or is it, you know, later when you realized? What I said to myself during that time was, "Wow, I'm really finding out where it's at." And the time when I was smoking the heaviest is when my marks were the worst. With me, it was a sort of thing where uh I forget if I made a phone call or mailed a letter or you know, small things like that, but all the small things I was sort of not sure if I did Yeah, did I remember handing that into the the report into the teachers? Is it still in my locker? You know, and then I'd have to go and check. With something about a week ago, I could usually remember it pretty well, but if it was something that day, I have I guess I had a lot of trouble with it. I mean, I forget to do things like, you know, I'd leave the oven, you know, I'd leave on the record player, you know, or I'd go into school and the guy, you know, the teacher would ask me something and I'd say, "Oh, wow." I don't know. One of the feelings like when you're getting stoned a lot is you don't whether you're stoned or not, you don't care about that much else. Like you just like, you know, think, "Wow, beautiful life is just lying back and grooving around." The closest time I've come to the sensation of being stoned, I think, was the time that um there was a show that we put on and I played in a band in it. And we made a tape of it and we're playing the tape and and we all got really happy because we're all lined there. No one's talking, but we're just we're just having this great sensation. And we all walked out the room with this this piece of music in our mind. And to me, you know, this seemed better. I don't know if it's if it's ever like this. The closest I've come to being stoned. Only so much better than being stoned because if you know that it's real. Yeah, and and you know, there's no down after it. There's there's a slight down, but you know, I can go out and play again and I I can get up and it I'm using myself. the thing is like if you get really happy and high on grass, it's nothing lasting, you know, like but you you learned you gained and learned something from that real feeling of happiness and success and it's a good it was a good thing that was building your personality and it's going to last, whereas when you get stoned, it's nothing, you know, it just goes right out of you again. Being stoned is just froth, you know, it's like just something something Yeah, it's froth. It's nothing meaningful, you know. And like it's like, you know, something that's maybe a little like sugar, something sweet and light that just disappears. It isn't like something that's really wholesome and fulfilling. When I first started smoking, uh I had a little oath with a few friends that we never do anything else. And then and then the couple of us tried crystal meth. A little later on, uh couple of my friends had tried acid, so I decided that for me the oath was nothing anymore. But I lasted about a year before I tried acid. And uh I wasn't afraid of it or anything by the time the year was up. I was just curious. I liked it an awful lot. Liked it too much, so I did it. And I ended up a week later I tried heroin just out of curiosity. And OD'd on it and almost died. I I I smoked and at first it was uh pretty fearsome because I I smoked a lot pretty much all the time. After a while it just became sort of common place thing to do. And I made my mind right then and said that I I wouldn't let it have the best of me at all, that it would just be sort of an added exotic essence in my in my life. But um as it turned out, I I stopped having having fun doing a lot of things that I used to do. And I stopped uh enjoying like walking uh downtown, you know, or playing, or uh or driving or anything, you know, unless I was stoned. It turned out pretty miserable. And it did get the best of me, too, cuz I got I was stoned all the time. I was buying it all the time. And then I got busted. And then that was like uh it was like the icing on the cake. Even even uh when you haven't smoked anything, you just sort of have a a very slow, you know, easygoing type of attitude. Just sort of flow along. Right. And you don't uh you don't pick up things as quick. You don't do anything as quick or as efficient, and it just uh it slowed the whole thing down. I've gotten really, really stoned at night, and then I had to drive from from Boston back to Richfield. And like my reflexes are just, you know, like rubber. My arms, you know, I'm I watch my hand doing the shifting, and it's just, you know, like a piece of rubber. It's ridiculous physically. With me, I can't I can't move as fast. Grass is depressing. See, you like you hit the brakes, and you don't think, "Well, I'm going to hit the brakes." You hit the brakes out of pure response. That to me is the frightening part. The the thoughts that I have when I'm driving a car aren't about the road, usually. They're about um they're about uh just totally disconnected things. Well, that can get a little dangerous. After a while, you can get only so high, and then it's really a boring experience, you know? Like you sort of you it's like not you don't freak out, you stone out, you know? It's nothing. I've had the experience, and it's over. So, I don't feel like I have to get really involved in doing it again. I wanted to like this spring, I sort of I was in I don't know, I was in sort of a self-destructive mood, and I just wanted to see how far I could self-destruct myself, and I did. And then after a while, I realized that it was ridiculous, and I stopped. How did you self-destruct yourself? What destructed Well, I don't know, like I was pretty unhappy. You know, and so um I didn't smoke to make myself happy. I just smoked because I was sort of fed up with things. And I was like trying to undermine myself, which is what I did. You know, my grades went down. I felt like I was losing contact with all my friends. I couldn't write as well, and everything like that. And then after a while, like the thing that got to me the most, like I didn't really care about the grades, but it bothered me very much that I couldn't write anymore, and it bothered me very much that I felt paranoid about friendships. And so, I just stopped smoking because I hated that feeling so much. I felt like the time I got really stoned, I went in the room with um friend of mine. We sat down, and every I just felt like everybody was staring at us, and you know, thinking "Look at those two. They really, you know, freaked out and stuff like that." I just felt so paranoid, like they all hated us, and they kept staring at us, and I just, you know, I just couldn't stand it. That's That's what I'm talking about, because like it didn't happen to me when I was stoned. When I was stoned with people, we were all brothers, and it was really nice. But when I was straight, I'd feel as if little things that I said were misinterpreted. And usually it doesn't bother me, like if somebody spilled a Coke on the rug, and I have to clean it up. But like I find myself, you know, somebody would do something like that, and I get so irritated. I just want to throw everybody out, and and so, I stopped smoking. Well, I I don't like to do grass or hash anymore. Um I'm sorry. Because I guess it's like I'm a lot happier without it. And it's I don't find it that, you know, particularly fantastic doing it. And I really like the tripping on mescaline. It was I don't know. I think I'd like to do that again. When we did When we did the mescaline, like um I sort of freaked out, not completely, but like it was bad, and we went up together. It the everything was split, like there were clumps of people, and I felt really frightened, because I felt very much alone. So, I went in the back room, and all of the sudden, like I didn't know what happened. I was shaking all over, and I was crying, and I was on the floor, and I was asking for my two cats that had died, and I was saying everybody hated me, and it was frightening, and everybody, you know, was saying, "No, we love you. Don't worry. It's okay. You know, calm down." But I really liked the experience, and I want to do it again. I don't know what it it's doing something to me. I'm not quite sure what it is. It's scaring me, I think. Cuz um it it you know, you're sitting here telling me that that that you really dug it, you'd do it again. You know, my reaction is, "What kind of a nut are you?" You know? That's my reaction to you. "What kind of an idiot are you?" You know, how could it it be good? How could it be pleasant? How could you want to do it again if all that stuff was happening to you? You can't really understand it, for like these are the I told you the bad things. And counteracting that was like the feeling like there was this one person. I didn't know him at all, and then like that night, somehow or other, we ended up tripping together. And and so, like, you know, we were just like I had I had to be supported or I fell over. We were just completely in each other's arms, you know? And it was just such a beautiful feeling of unity. And then like after I after I went home, you know, and and like where all where our arms had been touching, I could feel myself bleeding. And he he said he felt all this wind blowing through his body where we'd been touching. I just think that you're sick, that that it's just really ridiculous to be able to sit here and say that this is a fun experience that I would like to do, you know, again if you know, sometime next year or something, you know? But and then say that that that that there's unity and beauty in it, and everybody's hugging each other and feeling blood on their arm. I mean, that's that's totally disgusting. I felt it was disgusting. Cuz I can hug people with while I'm straight and feel love, and you and you can hug people while you're while you're stoned and feel blood. And that's that's sick, okay? Why is it sick? Why do you need a chemical to do that, man? Right. I'm And see, and I know that you're going to say, "Well, I don't. I can do that without a chemical, too." And then and then Well, then then I would say, "Well, why do you got to have a chemical for?" The things that are wrong with my personality, I would never dream of having with drugs. Like if I if I'm screwed up about something, I'm going to work it out through myself, not with anybody's help, not with a drug's help. I really don't believe you when when you say that you take care of your problems and and deal with things. And that's not why you get high. You get high for other reasons. The reason for me not believing you is just mainly because I've seen so many people say the same thing, and it ended up not to be true. Yeah. You can't You can't take the judgment from one situation and apply it to another. I'm just See, what I'm doing is taking it from experience, man, cuz I used to get high with people. I used to trip people, and the same thing has happened. And I would I I sat in the same chair, you know, years ago, saying the exact same things. Right. That's you. And this is me. And wait. And I know just through experiences that that that it's all nonsense. Well, I think what what what these 3 days has done for me, I don't know if if it's made me any stronger in terms of my beliefs. I don't know what really if it's done that, cuz my beliefs are pretty strong right now. You know, that I'm against drugs. I don't think people should take drugs and things like that. You know, I genuinely did genuinely did feel before that I wanted to do the mescaline again, for sure. I don't I don't I disagree with the mentality that I'm sick, and that I don't I can't find a sense of unity on my own, and everything like that, because I don't think it's true, you know? I know myself well enough, and I respect myself, and I couldn't do that if I thought that was true. But um you know, I think about it. Like I don't have a real reason, except that it was fun. And you know, like yeah, it's fun to drive a car really fast, too, but if it's endangering somebody's life, I'm not going to do it. I'm curious about the the drug experience, but I'm not curious enough to try it myself. I definitely don't want to try it myself. I don't think it's worth it. Uh the way I feel about Joanne and Lee is that they never really got into drugs, so you know, they don't the things that are messed up about them, they can take care of by themselves, and pretty easily, where I have a lot more things to take care of, and it's going to be a lot harder. Well, I feel like from talking to people, I have no desire to do mescaline again, and I like I know now that I'm totally that out of grass and hash, and like actually I'm finished with drugs, like I've satisfied my curiosity, and I'm happy without it, and I find I really don't need it. I'd rather turn into myself, rather than a drug, for any personal satisfaction I can get out of life. And I feel that um well, these people who try drugs, and then they decided it was a waste, well, the whole experience seems to me to be such a waste of time. I've never See, I've never had people I've never had anyone talk to me about against drugs before, and and just and really really argue with me about it. The only person that's ever told me anything about not taking drugs is my mother, and just because she's my mother, I never heard I never listened to her. I never even heard her. But person people my own age telling me this makes it all it makes it completely different. And Peter and and Gabe have to tell me. What makes you groove? What turns you on? What makes you groove? What turns you on?