Mushrooming Awareness - Part 3

If you have not yet read the preceding parts, you should start at the beginning.

Part 3: Disconnection

I was blind and alone. I had asked myself where I was, and found that I did not know. I rephrased the question. Where might I be? I knew that I had consumed a mug of mushroom tea sometime earlier at Gus's house along with a group of friends, and I knew that we had begun walking along High Street Road, with Norton's park being our planned destination. I remembered nothing however that could convince me that I had in fact made it to the park. If the mushrooms had taken effect faster than expected, it was entirely possible that we had become lost or sidetracked, and were now in a place that had never featured in our plan. I estimated that the tea had been consumed about two hours ago, that I walked at a around five kilometres per hour, and so decided that I could be anywhere within a ten kilometre radius of a point mid-way between Gus's house and Norton's park.

I was pleased with the progress I had made with that piece of deductive reasoning. Now, what use was that information to me? What dangers were there to avoid? Roads. Main roads. High Street Road running east/west across the centre of my circle, Burwood Highway parallel to the north, Ferntree Road parallel to the south, and Springvale Road perpendicular to the west. Cars and trucks hurtled along those roads at eighty kilometers per hour. For all I knew, I could be sitting in the middle of Ferntree Gully Road right now. There was no way for me to tell. Not only was my vision gone, I could not feel anything. Or rather, when I felt around me I could not be sure that what I was touching was road, grass, stones, wood, or any other surface I might be in contact with. Sometimes I wasn't sure I was touching anything at all.

If I was on a road, would I hear the traffic? I listened. I heard voices some distance away. A conversation was taking place. Laughter. My level of concentration or interest was not sufficient to determine the identity of the speakers, or what was being said, but the presence of voices told me I was with the others. I was relieved. I decided I probably would hear the traffic, but I might hear it too late, or not know which way to move to avoid a fast approaching vehicle. I hoped the others were more aware of their surroundings than I was.

What if they weren't? What if the voices and laughter I heard was incoherent and hysterical babbling? I imagined the group of us - myself, Pab, Gus, Mikhail, Juan, Dunric, and Aiden, some sitting, some wandering around in the dark, some silent, some babbling incoherently, all with little or no awareness of our surroundings, in the middle of an otherwise deserted Ferntree Gully Road. I imagined a large truck bearing down upon us. My view was from a point high above the side of the road, behind the group, and facing the truck. I heard the loud blast of a horn, and saw the dismally slow reactions of the group. Heads slowly turned around, some in the complete wrong direction. The tyres of the truck locked and screeched as they slid along the road. The collision could not be avoided.

I heard a retch. Oh dear. The trip was turning very bad. Who was vomiting? Was I vomiting? Again I did not know. I saw the same image as described in the previous paragraph, but now we were writhing around on the road in pools of vomit, and had no awareness at all of our surroundings. When the truck came this time there was no reaction. I never believed we were actually on the road, only that that was a possibility. The worst case scenario. The retching sound however seemed real, and that was still very bad. Bad because of the shame of being out in public, out of our minds on psychedelic drugs, and not being in control of the situation.

I thought of how the nation would react if we were all killed by a truck in the manner described. It would be front page news for sure. Advertisements on newsstands would scream "Seven Youths Killed in Highway Tripping Tragedy". The incident would spark a nationwide debate on drug culture among young people. My legacy would be the introduction of new draconian drug laws, and greater police presence at music festivals. That was not how I wished to be remembered.

I made another effort to get back to reality. I felt around with my hands, in front of and behind myself in such a way that if I had been sitting, my hands would have contacted whatever surface I was sitting on. I felt nothing as I did this. Not even the feeling of my arms moving through the air in response to my thoughts as I willed the movements. It seemed that I had completely lost my sense of touch. That was a little troubling. I pondered further. Would I be able to feel pain? I attempted to test this by striking myself on the chest with my fist. I felt nothing. That was very troubling. What if my arm had been severed and I was presently bleeding to death? Would I be aware of that fact? I was unsure.

The list of things I was sure of was shrinking rapidly. While feeling around me in search of the ground, I had been assuming I was sitting down. Now I questioned that assumption and found supporting evidence lacking. I imagined my body acting as if on complete auto-pilot. I could be running right now, I thought to myself. The idea seemed quite plausible then, and still does as I write. I often act or at least carry on acting in an automatic way when my concentration wanders from a task. And my concentration has never wandered so much as that night when I was on mushrooms. For example when reading my eyes sometimes continue following words long after my brain has stopped concentrating on the text. Sometimes when I snap back into consciousness I find myself many pages ahead of where I last remember reading. A similar thing happens when I'm thinking and bushwalking. I snap out of my trance and find I have successfully navigated many metres of ill-defined tracks through the trees, all with no memory of having done so. A similar thing may have been happening during my mushroom trip.

In one final effort to determine how my body was oriented, I willed my leg to move in order to stamp my foot on some solid earth. Despite the absence of feedback I had received when attempting to move my arms, I was unprepared for the psychological impact of doing this and feeling nothing. All my life, the reaction force of the solid earth beneath me had been a constant I could rely on, and the unquestioned fact of its presence must have been foundational in my conception of myself as a space-occupying entity existing in a material world. When I attempted the stomp of my foot and felt nothing - no resistance, no feeling of my leg moving, no feeling at all - my belief that I had a body, and that my world consisted of matter, dissolved.

Continued in Part 4: Escape

Mushrooming Awareness - Part 2

If you have not yet read part one, you should start at the beginning.

Part 2: Disorientation

We turned into a driveway that was our entrance to Norton's Park and were confronted with a red earth baseball diamond behind a high woven-wire fence. The structure seemed impressive and fascinating. So impressive and fascinating in fact, that despite myself and Aiden having cycled past that very place many times before, we now felt compelled to stop and discuss its merits at length. We pointed out to each other details of the metal joins, and speculated about what methods may have been used in its construction. The scale of the operation was difficult to comprehend. We tried to guess the number of dump-truck loads of red earth that would have been used to form the diamond, but failed to come up with a reasonable answer after abandoning an attempt at a calculated estimate.

When we realised that we had been become lost in conversation and had forgotten the purpose of our walk, we laughed then quickly continued along the path to a car park where we spotted Pab's car. I was relieved to see that he and the others had arrived safely. They had been waiting for Aiden and myself to catch up, and so when we did it was time to begin our trek into the forest.

The paths through the trees were narrow and winding, so we trekked single file. For most of the time we were silent, but occasionally someone would remark on what strange effects they were seeing, or that the mushrooms we had tonight seemed to be stronger than those we'd had previously. I was busy in my own thoughts and could only silently nod in agreement upon hearing such observations.

Mikhail and I had been lagging and after a while we became separated from the rest of the group. This was of some concern to me, since I did not know my way around the park, or where in the park the rest of the group were headed. I was walking behind Mikhail, and had been assuming that he knew where he was going. As our pace continued to slow I watched him and became convinced that he did not.

Mikhail spoke occasionally, and when he did his words were expressions of vague doubt. "I don't feel so good," "I don't know about this," he would say to himself as he wandered around, seemingly lost, with his arms feeling the way in front of him. He looked like a shell-shocked conscript, soon to be captured by the enemy or picked off by a hidden sniper. The others were occupied elsewhere, and so fate had cast me in the role of supporting soldier. I kept him under close supervision. Sometimes he would stop and call to me. "Tom! Where are you? I can't see you." When he lost me I would tap him on the shoulder and attempt to reassure him that all was well and we were safe. Sometimes when he claimed he was unable to see me he was looking directly at me.

I was having problems with visibility too, but not yet to the extent that Mikhail seemed to be. As I looked around everything I saw seemed to have been bleached. I figured the lack of contrast was a natural result of the excess light my eyes were receiving through my hugely dilated pupils. Sometimes I thought I saw a grey diamond grid overlaying everything, as if I was peering through a woven wire fence. I may have been seeing a visual echo of my earlier view through the fence at the baseball diamond. Other times it seemed that edges of objects in my view were lightly highlighted with speckled colour, similar to the effect sometimes seen when compressed digital images become corrupted. These effects came in waves. At the peak of the waves, discerning objects from the background was difficult, and I was unable to follow the path. At the troughs I was able to follow the path, but at a rate significantly slower than would have been possible without the mushrooms.

I figured Mikhail at that time was experiencing similar effects, though at a greater intensity. Watching him was like seeing myself in the worryingly near and fast approaching future. Having heard Mikhail's comments about his vision, I expected to lose my vision soon, and that is exactly what happened. The contrast between the greyish bark of the trees, the grey stones of the path, and the light yellow dried out grass of the undergrowth became so poor that I could no longer follow the path. I called to Mikhail. "Mik, I'm right with you now, I can't see a thing. I think we should stop for a while, since it would be dangerous to move."

Mikhail's faint response was uncertain, but in agreement. I crouched down but remained on my feet, as I realised that I had not taken note of my immediate surroundings, and so was unaware of what dangers were lurking around me. I felt with my hands to make sure the ground was suitable for sitting on, and when I was satisfied, I sat. Despite the loss of my vision, I still felt in control. My plan was to wait until my sight returned, enjoying whatever effects the mushrooms brought me as I did, and then to resume walking the path. I explained my plan to Mikhail, who was a few metres away from me somewhere on my right. Then I settled in for an extended period of rest and recuperation. To pass the time I pondered my strange predicament.

The previous day I had been working at my part-time job as an electronics lab technician. It was a very modern workplace, with computers and high-tech machinery used in a tightly regimented small-scale production line. I would have to return to that job the morning after next. Presently I found myself seated alone in the middle of a forest, blinded and immobile, with night fast approaching. It seemed as if I had stepped thousands of years backwards in time, to when man's only source of illumination besides sunlight was fire, and when a lone hunter roaming the woods would often find himself far from a campsite when darkness fell.

The reason I had chosen to participate in the mushroom trip had a lot to do with that image. I would have passed on the opportunity had the drug been a modern one such as acid or DMT, but mushrooms have always grown naturally, and so I imagined that throughout the entire history of man, accidental consumption would have resulted in a few lost hours of confusion and strange behaviour for unwitting or lost foragers. Therefore I viewed mushrooms as a natural part of the environment of man, and I felt fine about a little experimentation.

I mused for a while longer on how a prehistoric man, returning from a mushroom trip, would explain his unscheduled disappearance to his fellow tribesmen. A grunt, a raised eyebrow or two, some shrugs of shoulders, and that, I figured, would conclude the investigation. The experience would be purged from memory, and the tribe would go back to hunting and foraging.

My thoughts drifted back to the present day. Now, where was I? I was surprised to find that I hadn't the faintest idea. Just as I had imagined the memories of the cave men disappearing as they returned to their normal routine, my context switch from present to past then back to present had resulted in the purging of my own short-term memories. I was now not only blind and alone, but lost in a more profound sense than I had ever been before.

Continued in Part 3: Disconnection

Mushrooming Awareness

A few years ago I experimented with magic mushrooms. The first few times I tried them, the experience was quite mild. I noticed a few strange visual effects, and became fascinated by things around me that a straight person would not have found at all fascinating, but for the most part I could still function as a normal person. I could sense and avoid dangers around me, and I could communicate effectively with other people.

The next and last time I took magic mushrooms was only a few weeks after my first experience. I had what I thought to be the same dosage as the earlier times, but the effect was on a whole nother level. In this series of posts I recall my thoughts and experiences during my one intense mushroom trip.

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Part 1: Preparation

On the day of the trip, I rode my motorcycle to a Glen Waverley house that was owned by the parents of a friend of mine named Gus*. The basement of the house had become a hangout for the group of friends I socialised with at the time, and five others were already there when I arrived. Present besides myself and Gus were Juan, Dunric, Aiden, Pab, and Mikhail*. Dunric had brought mushrooms that he and Pab had picked earlier near Dunric's house in Doncaster. The previously arranged plan was to meet at Gus' house in the late afternoon, brew some mushroom tea, drink it, then move to nearby Norton's Park to enjoy the trip amongst the trees and natural surrounds.

Dunric, Pab, and Gus were busy preparing the tea when I arrived, and a short while later Dunric announced that the tea was ready to drink. He emerged from the basement carrying seven mugs on a tray, and Gus followed him with the teapot. All were gathered in the bright afternoon sunshine as the drinks were poured and passed around. It was a beautiful day. Some added honey to improve the taste of the tea, then we held our mugs and looked around nervously until Juan broke the silence. "Well, are we going to drink this stuff or not?"

We had reached the point of no return. All who were present raised their mugs and met the eyes of the others in the circle that had formed. We clicked our mugs together in silent ceremony, then downed the beverages quickly. Most of the group left their dregs behind, but I scooped them from the bottom of my mug with my fingers and devoured them all. The taste was not unpleasant.

I had assumed we would all walk to the park as we had done on previous occasions, but as I was preparing for the walk, Pab announced that he intended to drive. That did not seem such a smart idea to me, so I reminded Pab that he had just ingested an hallucinogenic drug, and that the effects of that drug would likely impair his driving ability. Pab was no fool however. He remembered clearly the mushroom tea he had drunk less than a minute ago, and was well aware of its likely effects. He argued that the mushrooms would not kick in for at least another half-hour, and since the park was only five minutes away by car, he would arrive long before he was affected. Pab's decision worried me a little, but I realised that further argument was futile. I ended up walking to the park with Juan, Dunric, and Aiden, while Gus and Mikhail rode in the car with Pab.

A short while later, as Juan, Dunric, Aiden, and I were walking along a service lane of High Street Road, in a rush of heightened perception I became aware of the effect of the mushrooms. I stopped and looked around at my suburban street surroundings, studying the subtle distortions that had begun to appear. I looked at Aiden who had stopped too, and saw that his pupils were hugely dilated. He looked at me and his excited but apprehensive expression must have mirrored my own. Aiden suppressed his giggling long enough to express our shared thoughts in words. His prediction: "I think we're in for a hell of a trip."

* Names have been changed to protect the privacy and dignity of those concerned.

Continued in Part 2: Disorientation