Falling into the hole

The other night I was watching this show on Comedy Central, The Soup, and they showed this clip of Miley Cirus smoking something called Salvia out of a bong at her 18th birthday party. They explained that it was a mild hallucinogen that is sold legally over the counter and though I had never heard of it, I figured she was really smoking weed and sold it as Salvia because that's what her PR people told her to do...

Friday morning as I was getting ready to go to work I did a big stretch and knocked over the bong, breaking it in the process, of course. Sigh... always so flimsy... anyways... After work on Friday I stopped at the local head shop to get a new bong and while I was picking one out I noticed the display on the counter selling Salvia.

Having just watched teen queen Miley Cyrus smoke some of this I figured it must be pretty light and good for a giggle. So I asked the guy behind the counter about it. He said that it is a mild hallucinogin that you smoke and it lasts about 5 minutes and is related to the sage family. He also said that for a beginner I should not have more than one hit. So I picked the second weakest strain of it (out of four strengths) and brought it home to break in the new bong with.

I didnt actually get around to trying it until later that night around 9:30 when Danny agreed to be the sober observer and make sure nothing bad happened. He loaded the bong and handed it to me, I had a small hit, set the bong down and waited. A couple minutes went by before I noticed anything, and then it was only out of the corner of my eye.

I was sitting in my chair facing the tv and I wave my arms a little bit to try and gauge what I am seeing exactly... The best way that I found to describe it was that I was looking at my bedroom still and everything seemed to be normal, but around the edges of my vision I could see these lines. And they kind of encompassed my vision like brackets, and then I realized what they were... pages. I was seeing the reality of my bedroom as a book whose pages had come loose and I could reach out and turn one of them and see what was behind it...

As soon as I made the conscience realization that I was in fact seeing something, it began to fade away. And the high wore off and I barely registered that I had been high and my mind returned to it's normal rational state and I convinced myself that I hadn't really seen much of anything. Danny said that he didn't really see anything abnormal aside from my waving my arms. My eyes didn't take on a crazy hue and I didn't start talking funny. So I chalked it up to "Over-The-Counter-Instant-Remedy" schlock and wasn't really thinking twice about it.

Now I dont know if it was simply out of habit to reach for the bong again, but after the first hit had worn off I grabbed the bong and took another slightly deeper hit. Danny took the bong and set it down and went back to watching his show and me... I sat back down in the chair and a couple minutes went by of chatting and then I noticed a weird sound. I couldnt quite identify what it was so I started looking around. It was Danny... he was still talking, but somehow his voice had taken on this odd dull thudding quality and it kind of began to echo in my ears.

I wasn't quite sure what was going on with me. You see, enough time had elapsed between the time that I took the hit and the time that it hit that I had actually forgotten that I had taken the hit. Thinking that I had just hit the normal stuff out of the bong, not the Salvia.

I stood up quite abruptly and Danny's dull wooden voice stopped abruptly. I looked around the room and was noticing that they actually get it pretty accurate in the movies when they show someone drugged or passing out... The room began to flash in and out... I braced my self against the bed and started to back up to sit back down in the chair. By this point I was barely able to register sight... I could still see... but my eyes were in between being clenched shut, darting wildly around the room to get my bearings or trying to see where I was going to fall.

Finally I found the chair and with a heavy drop I fell into it. But it was wrong. Falling into that chair felt almost like falling into a black hole. As I plop into the chair I feel this immense gravitational force pulling me backwards almost as if through the chair. I cant understand this unseeable force so I struggle hard against it. I stretch my legs out straight and lock my knees and I flail my arms wildly. Anything but putting them down and making it easier to suck me through the hole in the back of the chair. The image that best captures this feeling is in "The Nightmare On Elm Street" when Johnny Depps character flops back into the chair and falls right through into the Hell of Freddy's dream.

I imagine this is what it feels like when you are poisoned. You know there is something wrong, you are spinning and gravity is all off but you cant quite identify what has happened. My vision is almost totally gone now, all I can see is the blackness closing in around me, the same blackness that is trying to pull me into the chair.

I keep fighting it... I don't really know what I'm saying but all of a sudden I hear Danny's voice and it is really close... "I'm falling" I try to scream to him, and then I find his arm. Solid ground. I hold on. He is literally the only thing preventing me from bring sucked into oblivion.

I keep trying to pull myself up and out of the chair, but the suction of the black hole behind me is just too great. I pull on Danny and he manages to get me sitting upright. The look on my face, he said, was panic and sickness and he wasn't sure if I wasn't going to pass out, throw up or die right there. I kept trying to fight the pull of gravity behind me and Danny kept trying to get me to lay back and relax into it, I kept fighting the pull until eventually it got too strong and I couldn't see anything and it pulled me back.

I hold on to Danny's arm for dear life. He's talking to me... He's trying to sooth me... He's very nervous... He mentions something about an ambulance and I think of poisoning again... what's happening to me... He says something about being scared... and I think I've gone blind and am in the middle of dying here... he says something about having an adverse reaction to this drug...

"THAT'S IT!" I screamed out repeatedly... "That's what it is..." I just kept saying that as I held on to his arm... He thought I meant that I was having an adverse reaction to the Salvia, but that's not what it was... He reminded me about the drug. I had forgotten that I had taken the second hit. I couldn't explain what was happening to me and so I was freaking out.

When he said the word "Drug" I remembered that I was just high and that I had smoked a hallucinogenic drug that was supposed to last for about 5 minutes and then I began the process of talking myself out of the hole. I kept saying "Thats what's going on" and "I understand now". I tried to reassure Danny and tell him that I was going to be ok... I know what's happening... I kept talking until I felt the gravity in the room return to normal and I could breath clearly again. I blinked until the moments of blackness in my vision had passed.

Once the effects of the drug had passed I laid back in my chair and breathed until I had calmed my racing heart and my terrified mind. This was no kids drug. This looked like pot and smoked lightly but man I have never LOST CONTROL before like I did on this drug. I had the textbook definition of a bad trip. Maybe if I had smoked it and laid down and waited for the hit to come my experience would have been different, maybe if I had listened to the guy at the store and only taken one hit it wouldn't have been that bad. I came out of that experience terrified for my life and scared enough to never want to try Salvia again.

I think on this one I'm probably gonna side with the conservatives... it shouldn't be available over the counter... Also... I now have to hang my head in shame that Miley Cyrus can maintain on drugs better than I can. What is this world coming to? Is nothing sacred??