My dad was yelling at me. His beard and hair had overtaken his face and he looked like a werewolf. I wasn’t sure at the time what he was angry about because I was too busy watching the curtains drip down the wall behind him. There I was, chained to a bed in the hospital. I had no clue how long I had been there, but it seemed like weeks had past since i last experienced reality.
The end is no place to start a story; however, so let’s start at the beginning. I was still in High School and my friends and I were going through a very experimental phase. I can’t remember where we got the idea, but we heard of a local desert plant called Jimsonweed that was supposed to be highly hallucinogenic.
We should have known not to f’ck with it. After-all it’s also known by the name ‘The Devil’s Trumpet’. We were also incredibly naive. The rumors we heard said that if you made a tea from the leaves that it could kill you, so we avoided those. What we heard was to crack open the pods and eat the seeds.
The first time I ate those seeds I only ate a small amount. Like ten or twenty of them. I was mostly unaffected. I felt a little sick, but didn’t have any hallucinations. My friends ate much more than I did and they explained to me later that they had very vivid trips. So I decided to up the dosage. The next day I ate several more of the seeds.
Now, to interject, Jimsonweed is a very potent hallucinogen. It is also very toxic and deadly so I don’t recommend that anyone ever try this. Let this story serve as a warning to you. Jimsonweed causes very vivid hallucinations, but it also causes some serious black-out periods. Your body will continue carrying on, and reacting to reality, or lack thereof, around you. But it is like you are a passenger in your own mind. Your body will act on its own impulses and you don’t really have very much control over what you do.
So, my second trip went a little like this. Eat the seeds, sit on the couch watching TV, smoking pot with my friends. Suddenly, like there’s a skip in time, it is now later. I’m smoking a cigarette and sitting on the couch. I have to go to the bathroom so I set my lit cigarette down on the table next to me (not in the ashtray). I stand up and walk to the bathroom. I feel like I’m being followed. Time skips again and I’m standing in the bathroom. Sam is standing in the tub next to me behind the shower curtain. I don’t know who Sam is, or why he is there but he’s watching me and it really creeps me out.
“Go away Sam, I can’t piss with you watching” I yell at him.
Time skips again and I am looking at the wall. My favorite outfit hangs on the towel racks. It’s my baggiest blue JNCO jeans, and an old air force shirt with the slogan “Mess with the best, die like the rest” on it. I decide to change. So I strip down and put on my outfit like they were the Emperor’s new clothes.
Time skips again and I’m back in the living room. Happy to be in my favorite jeans I sit on the couch, spread eagle. My friends were not pleased.
Time skips again and I remember someone asking me if I wanted a cigarette.
“Yes”
I took the cigarette, lit it, and then ate it.
Time skipped one final time and it was the next day. I don’t remember how I got home, or what happened after eating that cigarette.
Still I hadn’t learned my lesson. I decided I was going to take more Jimson. I had heard that drinking orange juice with hallucinogens enhanced the effect. So I decided I would eat half a pod of those seeds and follow it up with a glass of orange juice.
After I ate it I don’t remember much of what happened for about three days. The first thing I remember is laying down on my friend’s mom’s bed to take a nap. Time skipped. I was walking down the hallway towards the kitchen. My friend’s mom was standing in the way. She was screaming at me and at him. Trying to get him to tell her what I took and what I was on. Time skipped and I was at my house walking through the living room. My friend and his mother were talking with my dad and the house was illuminated by flashing red lights. Some men in uniform were talking to me, but it was all in some foreign language I’ve never heard.
Time skipped again and I vaguely remember getting my stomach pumped. I remember the horrendous taste of the charcoal, and watching the black ooze pour out of my mouth. After this everything blurs together. I’m not sure where the time skipped, or where it stopped.
I was in a hospital bed. I either heard or saw some of my friends walking in the hallway, I’m not sure which. I got out of the bed and walked toward them. I pulled the IV out of my arm, and stripped the catheter out of my d’ck. I walked into the hallway and saw two of my friends walking toward me. The strange thing is that those two friends were not speaking to each other at the time so they were not together. Also, neither of them remember this happening.
After that I was restrained to the bed. This is when I remember my dad there lecturing me. I don’t remember much after that, it was all a blur. I almost died during that experience. I was told that had I not had my stomach pumped I would not be here today.
So, lesson learned? Not at that time. I still did a ton of stupid sh’t after that, but I never did do jimsonweed again.
