DOSE:

2 hits

oral

LSD

(blotter / tab)

BODY WEIGHT:

150 lb

As of this writing, about three and a half years later, no psychedelic experience that I've had even comes close to the awe-inspiring beauty of my first acid trip (well, except for DMT...). I've had countless mushroom trips, plenty of experiences with HWBR seeds, a few solid rolls, and every time 5-meo-this or 2C-that comes my way, I try a bit. But my first date with LSD blows them away.

My two friends A and E (both experienced trippers) and I dosed around lunchtime. I had no real intentions or goals for this trip, nor had I done much research on the subject. A and E seemed to like the stuff quite a bit, and that was good enough for me. After all, they'd been right about psilocybin and LSA (the only other two psychedelics I had tried at the time). So we dosed (I took two hits), and sat around A's room for a while waiting for the substance to come on. After about forty minutes, I started feeling goofy and climbed under A's bed. I noticed tracers, and started to wave my hands around. I also noticed a metallic taste in my mouth that seemed to come from my upper lip. As an aside, I had purchased 25 hits of that acid, and every time I took it, I got that taste in my mouth. Not only have I not had that effect from any other psychedelic, I haven't even had it from any other batch of acid. I tend to get flushed from psychedelics, so I think it had something to do with the blood rushing to my head. Finally, I experienced some physical discomfort, especially in my mid back. I heard a voice in my head say the whole point of this is to get comfortable.

We had intended to peak in the middle of the blizzard raging outside, but the snowfall subsided right before we left our college dorm. It was hard to be disappointed, though, as we were left with enormous mounds of pristine snow to enjoy. We went for a romp in the less heavily traveled areas of our serene campus, and came upon, of all things, three other students gleefully tripping acid in the snow. Better still, each of them mirrored an aspect of each of us (or vice versa or both simultaneously, or whatever). A's mirror was exuberant and expressive, E's was confident and funny, and mine was quiet and thoughtful. To be more clear, these were actual people from our campus (coincidentally, I had first met one of them during the most overwhelming mushroom trip of my life, and was convinced that he was a figment of my imagination for some time). In that moment, however, the juxtaposition was uncanny. I had had no visuals as of yet except for the tracers, but this was already too much for me to take. I was feeling uncomfortable, and didn't really want to be a part of this strange geometrical arrangement. My ego was too precious, I didn't want to be someone else's reflection. We all headed back to our dorms together, but I put my headphones on and tuned out of the group and into some electronica/pop music. At this point, my first visuals appeared -- golden plants of some kind growing around the periphery of my vision. They did not seem to be part of the landscape, it felt more like they were superimposed like CGI over the film that was my experience of the world.

When we reached our dorms, a bong was loaded up and sent around. I don't think I took more than one hit. A was talking about how he wasn't tripping nearly as hard as he had wanted to, he was somewhat disappointed. I, on the other hand, was beginning to trip balls. I was filled with emotions I couldn't explain, so much so that I was uncomfortable being around other people. A and E seemed to be doing their own thing, so I went back to my room by myself.

Once there, I put on some euphoric rock music and was almost immediately overcome with joy! Light was bursting from every corner! I watched waves of winter sunlight ripple across my desk and thought then (and I still think now) that it was one of the most beautiful things I'd ever seen. The nostalgia as I write this, even months and months later, is strong. After exulting at the sheer unadulterated beauty of the everyday for a while, I was inexplicably drawn straight to a box I had stashed beneath my desk. The contents of this box were drawings, letters, and assorted mementos from one of my first romantic relationships.

This relationship had, for all intents and purposes, ended about four months previous, but was not really over yet because she was romantically involved with one of my new friends at college. To put it briefly, the whole relationship was a nightmare. The whole thing dripped with enough tedious hyperbole, pointless drama, and mind-boggling coincidence to be a rejected hollywood script. But what I had really loved about this girl was that she was an artist. Her art had struck me as a really unique self expression, a communication that went beyond words.

So there, tripping balls on the floor of my room, it wasn't the letters I was interested in, but the drawings. After contemplating curvy lines on paper for a while, there was an explosion in my brain: art. I was an artist. Art is what I need to do.

Now, this didn't come completely out of the blue. My father is a professional artist, and has been making a living off of his oil paintings for almost thirty years. I used to draw a lot in junior high, but had traded art for music when my social circles changed. So, I wasn't a stranger to art, but it was still something I hadn't seriously thought about for five years. I decided that I had to start making art immediately, so I began scanning my room for potential supplies.

What I found was my mirror (my canvas!), the sun reflecting of it in all its glory (my muse!), and two cans of unused shaving cream (my paints!). After putting up a sign on my door that said Do not disturb! I assure you, this is meditation!, I got to work. Now, this was probably some of the most outrageous fun I have ever had in my life. The menthol smell of the shaving cream was overwhelming. The texture was incredible. And between the sunlight reflecting off the mirror and the relentless open eye visuals from the acid, my creation was growing and transforming on its own, even as I was building it. After a while, I began using masking tape to add a different texture to the mirror. When I showed my friends, however, they were unable to see what I was so excited about. I found out later that some of them were pretty sure I had lost my mind. I asked my friend M for her camera, and tried to capture what I had seen, with the sun's assistance. Operating the camera was a challenge, my hands were bursting with nervous energy and holding them steady was an act of will.

After the photos, I regrouped with my friends, who were going out to eat. I debated going with them, but they had a full car already. Besides, I couldn't stop moving and gesturing, and I probably would not have been able to control myself very well in public. I asked them to bring me back a salad. Now it was time to clean up. I experimented with music I don't normally listen to, some blues, some hip hop, and found myself not just liking but loving pretty much everything I heard. Cleaning up became an exciting dance; I was hopping around like a frog while cleaning stray foam off of my door. When I had finished, I spent some time with A, who had also decided to pass on the restaurant. He packed a pipe with tobacco, and told me to take as big a hit as I could. The taste was unbelievably horrible, but the rush almost knocked me off my feet. Worth trying once, at least. Our friends returned with food, and I proceeded to eat as slowly as humanly possible. I had no interest in silverware, and picked individual components out of the salad one by one, studied them, and then carefully ingested them. I had the vague impression that I was eating a densely populated coral reef.

I was about a quarter of the way through the salad, when I felt the urge to drum. Now, I'd been a guitar player for five years at the time and had never touched a drum, nor did I know anybody who had a drum. So I wandered back to my room, and disassembled a crappy display for a crappy presentation, and used the hollow plastic base as a drum. Was it an effective drum? No. Did I care? Not even a little. I stripped naked, turned on loud hard psychedelic rock music, and went to town. I tried as best I could to follow the rhythms I was hearing, but I was mostly just exploding in a rapture of sound and aggressive physical motion.

As I drummed, my head filled with closed eye visuals and improbably conclusions. I saw fleshy spirals pivoting around eyes. I saw, from above, a woman dancing in spirals with a flowing skirt beneath her. It occurred to me that there are intrinsic differences between the way males communicate and the way females communicate. A conversation between men is like a snowball fight; not only is it competitive but it's direct. But conversation with women is more like a dance: cooperative and frequently sidestepping/spiralling around the central issue. Obviously, this is a blanket generalization, but it struck me as profound at the time. I saw myself (but a little older?) living in a tiny apartment with a beautiful young woman (with dark straight hair and a grey sweater). We didn't care that our apartment was small because we loved each other and spent all our free time creating beautiful art and music with each other. She went to the window, and rested her head in her hands, watching a butterfly dance in the air outside. My vision followed the butterfly out the window, and I realized that my lover and I were quite literally living in a hole in a wall. Colored light was pouring out from behind the butterfly; the light become bricks and the bricks stacked themselves in a multi-colored pyramid. Shadowy reptile people roamed around the base of it.

There were many more, but those were the most vivid. By the time I finally stopped, I had been drumming for almost three hours. My hands were numb, red, and throbbing, but I still felt incredible. And, the trip was still going strong! I put on clothes, grabbed my ipod, and wandered outside. I had no idea where my keys were, but I figured I could leave my door unlocked this once.

It was late enough (and cold enough) at this point, that there were almost no other people outside. Great! I roamed around listening to more electronica/pop and psychedelic hard rock and grooved on open and closed eye visuals. The arms of a lamppost became spirals with square corners. The cloudy sky, complete with glowing orange moon, was the head of an unfathomably large (and not in the least threatening) monster. Guitars sounded to me like the singing of primordial reptilian people, and at one point the vision of the multi-colored pyramid with the lizard people returned. The leader had an enormous headdress that vibrated with electricity. He was doing a strange dance that I felt compelled to replicate. I was only mildly concerned that someone might see me. Dancing in the snow was fun, until my enthusiastic gyrations ripped my headphones out of my ears and sent them flying into the tundra. Needless to say, I did NOT find my white headphones in a field of snow, at night. No biggie. I was still euphoric.

I came back to my room, discovered that I had given A my keys for safekeeping and completely forgot, and got warm. By this point, it was about 2 am, my first awareness of time, and I had been tripping, hard!, for about fourteen hours. I wanted a conversation that was more like a dance and less like a snowball fight, so I called up the aforementioned ex-thing (we still spoke from time to time) to share with her my experience. The conversation was mostly weird, but I was still too euphoric to care. From my perception, skewed I'm sure, she seemed totally self-interested. When interacting with her on normal days, I frequently felt like I had no special value to her, that I was just another admiring face in the crowd. Tripping was no different, but thanks to the manic euphoria, it didn't really bother me until later. I also noticed her tendency to gravitate slowly towards dark topics about her past and then change the subject right before the point of no return. I noticed her doing this several times consecutively, and tried to point it out. However, my brain was beginning to melt down at this point, and I was unable to articulate any complicated thoughts. Instead, I contented myself by watching the little spheres of light generated by the christmas lights in my room gently bob like puffer fish swimming in a current (they even developed little fins!). Finally, I got off the phone and went to bed. The next morning, I felt incredible. Thinking and moving were effortless. I was happier than I'd been in years.

Long term effects of this particular trip:

I continue to this day to make art. Ink, colored pencil, paint, doesn't matter. I've started using art software, and I regularly make spontaneous gifts of artwork to my friends, especially those I haven't seen in a while.

I continue to this day to enjoy percussion, especially when tripping. I tap out syncopated rhythms while listening to music, I beatbox when I'm waiting at the bus stop, and I acquired a djembe.

I took up yoga, and continue practicing almost daily. Partially because all my friends were doing it, but partially because the whole point of this is to get comfortable.

I started dancing more often, and really enjoying it.

I was convinced that EVERYONE should try acid, and proceeded to share my stash with as many of my uninitiated friends as I could. These days, I'm much less enthusiastic about the idea of the whole world tripping, but at the time I was pretty into it.

The nervous energy lasted for almost two weeks, during which I was gesturing and moving around FAR more than I normally do.

And finally, I have NEVER had a trip comparable to this one. My head has never felt so foreign and so familiar simultaneously. I consider this a very robust +++, and I should probably mention that I've never more than flirted with a ++++, no matter what I've taken. All my subsequent acid trips (and there have been quite a few) have been far inferior, ranging from muddled to casual to confusing to neurotic to just plain boring. I doubt I will ever experience anything quite like this trip again. The persistent euphoria was incredible. The CEVs were more compelling and intricate than any I've had since.

In general, I prefer psilocybin. LSD is just too damn long of a trip. Rarely am I energized all the way through, and I end up feeling like my head is in a vice after about eight hours. Most of my other LSD experiences beyond ++ have been somewhat unpleasant, due to physical discomfort, emotional confusion, and garbled motor skills. Still, I would never undo this trip. The experience was one of the most momentous of my life.

Exp Year: 2005	ExpID: 79675
Gender: Male
Age at time of experience: 20
Published: Oct 17, 2022	Views: 848
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