The Lost Art of Drug Abuse part1

The lost art of drug abuse.
Yes, I very purposely placed that word abuse in the title. The assumption is that if you were or are pro-drug culture you'd choose a word other than abuse when speaking about it. I use the word abuse, because as much as it expanded my mind, and shaped who I am today, it also ravaged my body, and took some part of my soul with it.
Psychedelics are a topic of choice, most intellectual spiritualists will list a period of consciousness expansion, opening your mind to what the average bystander takes for granted. The magic that's in the air, in front of us every waking moment, of every day.... Every moment of slumber for that matter. You can pluck a note from the waves in the air, as music pulses through your psyche. Those moments when you have to breath in deep and shiver, because intense forces all align in a moment and you sync with the moment. How many of us are here, right now? We are spread across our fears, our past, laundry, what we have to do tomorrow. But what about now?
Energy, amazing sparks of life flow around us always, we can reach out and grasp it. Let it flow into our fingers, until it ends up deep inside our souls. This part, actually has nothing to do with drugs, I'm sober now, and as far as illegal drugs, they are part of my past, but I do not regret what I learned from those times.
There were horrible moments, bleeding from my head, walking down a dirt road, I was dying and nowhere. I was 16, and the promise of a drug deal led me to the brink of death, it wasn't the first, and far from the last time that intoxicants would lead me to the fringe of this mortal life. I've been poisoned, overdosed, and even let a common cold almost kill me. I have had my head smashed in enough times that doctors don't even know how to put me back together. Modern medicine, and psychology falls just short of being able to rewire what's disconnected inside of me.
I remember my first beer. My first toke off of a joint, I remember when I outgrew marijuana. My first experience with LSD was just a couple weeks after my first joint. It didn't slow down, it was all encompassing. Skateboard, sex, and drugs. What started in a friends empty house with Nirvana and chili peppers on a small stereo, quickly led to warehouses, half pipes, with DJs spinning Front 242 and Kraftwerk. Those were times of self discovery. One moment pulsing music, the next a giant room of people, all silent, drawing on whatever paper we could find.
Sitting on a warm summer night, feeling the grass between your fingers, as you watch the treeline flow with you. Love and addiction, seeing all the beauty that gets wasted on normal eyes.
It's dark, cold, and we always end up in this stupid alley, because cops seldom walk this area. The pipe passes from mouth to mouth, what's in it varies by evening, trends and years. It's the other side. Even the psychotropics that led us in spiritual moments. Also found us on bathroom floors, trying to remember how to breath... Numb fingers, everything has layers of filth, that stick out, mocking you, making sure you don't forget what you swallowed that night.
Who was your first friend you saw in a casket? Heroin and meth have replaced those recreational trips. Full blown habits had us, they were in control, not us. Remember getting high before you left for the funeral? It made it easier to cope. Everyone shared bottles and cans in the parking lot, toasting to our friend...
I remember being "taught" that snorting 1-2 No Doze, was the same rush as swallowing 5, it came on faster and more intense. I remember watching someone cry for three hours because they had swallowed over 20, and thought they were going to die. What did you snort first? Are we not allowed to speak of things? Has this suddenly changed into a dark topic? We don't want to remember those moments. Even if that first night was happy, once you let one powder into your nose, what was the difference? You enjoyed this... You might as well inhale this too. I remember the first time I was poisoned, sick on a psychotropic, one I won't name, we would trip for four days, after losing every shred of sanity for 8 hours. My fingernails turned dark purple and I knew, instantly that I'd taken too much. I rode it out, tried to find the entertaining side of it, but it's hard when your heart is beating in your throat. You are sitting slightly beside yourself, everything is off. The wall is breathing at you. When I dropped to my knees after smoking meth for two days, I was finally "awarded" a big line of cocaine... "Shit, I just fucked up." knees, everyone is staring, muffled "is he?", "are you ok?" then it kicks back. I was lost for a moment, and now I was welcomed quickly being too high, overdosed by definition. I stood, my face flush and hot, then cold instantly. I knew I had just damaged myself, I laughed and lit a cigarette, as the strippers sat back down.
My present for my 16th birthday, my first line of meth, pure from California. One line and before you know it three days have passed. I drank a pint of hot damn 100 proof that same night... I didn't feel drunk until the next day. 10 am and I start laughing, everyone is snapped out of their trance. "remember that hot damn I drank? I'm drunk now!" those first few years meth just came around on occasion, the ingredients to make it weren't illegal yet, so there was an actual high, now people are doing this disgusting mix of things they call meth. It wakes you up, but you hate yourself the second you feel it, if I walked away regretting any drug, it was meth.
Heroin makes you slump, write poetry in your head, thoughts are all you have, you're swimming in consciousness. Where dreams meet this world. You can hear everyone, your senses are there, but you're not. I had a rule about needles, a line I'd never cross, except the one fucking time I was pushed to. "I'll do this once, then never ask me again." I kept my word, I never shot up again. I smoked my heroin... Ate it in capsules a couple times. I'd already had my bouts with opiates, in pill form. In fact, my father was the first person to accidentally introduce me to opiates... The hellfire and brimstone preacher, gave me two bottles of coda-clear, I'd had a dry cough for two weeks. That was gone by the next day... Sitting in a corner at school, talking with a friend, I pulled out a spoon and the bottle, took two teaspoons. A few minutes later in class I felt so relaxed. "what's in this?" I pulled the bottle out: 90% codeine solution. I'd heard of codeine. Chug, right there in class. By the end of school both bottles were empty, I was laughing at everyone in wood shop, and just walked out... Balls deep in my first opiate high. It was not a wasted experience, it was a blur of walking, laughing and sex. It takes forever to cum when you're that high on opiates, not for lack of trying though.
To be continued in part II...