doctor G
10-03-2004, 11:45 PM
Drug Tales from my Childhood
Getting High from 1968 on......
My childhood was full of trees and tall rocks, so itâ??s no surprise that when I started smoking I took to the heights. There were several heavily wooded glades around my childhood community where we would asend ten to fifteen feet above the ground and begin to pass the joint. Newcomers to the circle were often shocked when three or four of us would swing into the branches of some friendly pine tree and head up. Some folks just would not join us and would wait on the ground hoping we would drop the joint. The rule was if you dropped it you had to climb down and get it. More than occasionally someone would fall out of the tree after the sixth joint. Our friends learned how to wrap a leg onto place and be comfortable when they were high. We heard stories from the other folks at parties.
â??...Not only was the joint the size of a Lucky Strike and sweet but those maniacs had to climb thirty feet up in a tree to smoke it..â?
What these folks failed to appreciate was that mosquitoes donâ??t fly much above fifteen feet, so the higher we were the less we got bit.
Occasionally we got stoned in the local pastures and then there were the occasional bouts of cow tipping. Cow tipping is pretty funny, unless the pasture has an electric fence; then itâ??s hilarious. It isnâ??t easy to get four or five heavily stoned individuals to quietly push together on a eight hundred pound bovine, much less sneak up on it. But if you are lucky enough to get this far then the real fun begins; getting over the fence without being zapped. The cows know better than people how much that fence hurts and they will chase you right to the edge.
Collecting the mushrooms was a similar situation, but add headlamps and
paranoia.
In June of 1970 John and I were getting stoned in one of the trees on the town green. We had climbed almost thirty feet into an evergreen and the thick branches screened us from view. After the two if us had finished the third joint, and placed the roach carefully in the crotch of two branches, we noticed the local High School graduation was set up at the far end of the green. When the class president encouraged participation in the war in Viet Nam we began shouting from the tree top â??Drop Nixon Not Bombsâ? and â??Stop the Draftâ? After a bit they turned up the PA system and sent a cop over to our tree. Now John and I looked like a couple of hippies; tall, skinny, very long hair, scraggly beards, blue jeans, and army surplus t shirts. The poor cop they sent over was maybe five ten and well over two hundred fifty pounds. He was not a tree climber, and had not climbed any trees since he was ten or so. Eventually we came down and he lectured us about our behavior and appearance. After a while he got bored and we walked away.
In a state park in the county and we discovered a cave that overlooked a favorite bird watching trail. We could cram five or six people into this crack in the rocks and after a few joints it was hard to resist heckling the passing crowd. Eventually we decided on the bird call from the old â??George of the Jungleâ? cartoon. â??Auk, Auk; EEK, EEK; Tookie, Tookie!â?
Fortunately the entry and exit for this crack were concealed and not easily found. More than a few birdwatchers looked around for the source of this unusual chorus.
We also climbed many rocks, and our smoking trails would include face climbs of twenty and thirty feet. Several of our favorite trees were a mile or more into the local woods. We would play a twisted follow the leader with our friends.
â??Want to smoke a joint??â?
â??Sure!!â?
â??Follow me..........!â?
Rick and I knew the trails like the local deer and we would bound along. Most of our closer friends could keep up, but newbees or friends of friends sometimes had problems. Rick and Jeff and I would bound up a finger sized crack in a twenty foot wall and then wait for Tom and Shaun and the rest of them. Another quarter of a mile through the swamp and then up the branches of this magnificent ancient old oak. Thirty feet in the air at a fork and branch in the trunk that provides comfortable seating for ten. Above the bugs and swamp gas we had a magnificent view for miles. With the ocean in the distance and the three hundred year old church on the hill, we relaxed with a sea of green foliage shimmering all around us.
All of this was hard enough on the unsophisticated, then we threw in the Chilum. While traveling through Asia in the sixties I encountered some monks smoking hash from an upright pipe, held between the palms. Three small pebbles selected from the path provided a screen to support the hash. It took several tries but finally I understood, this device was a She Loom (Chilum). Now I understood the purpose for the object I had seen in so many market stalls, and when I next saw one I purchased it. Back in the States not too many people had seen one, and my brother and I enjoyed springing new paraphernalia on people after they were pretty high.
My brother and I had pretty good balance. We had been riding unicycles for ten years and now we were smoking with two hands balanced on a branch thirty feet up. Jeff would sit on Rickâ??s right and I always passed the pipe to Rick first. The three of us would try to show newcomers how to hold it properly, but not everyone listened. Jeff picked up pretty quick, but then he was with us six days a week. We made it look easy but then we had a lot of practice. Eventually someone would stick it in their face and burn their tongue, no matter how many times we warned them.
At one point we came into possession of a full face tear gas mask. After removing the carbon filter, but leaving the one way valves in place, we epoxied a glass funnel to the end of the canister and bored the stem of a briar pipe to fit the stem of the funnel. We also left the straps in place. You would load the bowl with five or six grams of weed then strap this on your head. When you had it securely in place you gave a thumbs up and someone would apply a flame to the bowl. Within a second or two the face piece filled with smoke and your eyes began to sting. You closed your eyes and tried to breathe, but more smoke came in. If you coughed or exhaled the one way valves kept the bowl from spilling and a puff of smoke would exhaust from the side. Three good lungs full and you had cashed the bowl. Of course by then you might need a little help getting the straps off and the mask released. Thatâ??s why it was only brought out when there were several people around, this was buddy smoking. After a night with this monster you would have a yellow resin ring on your face.
Chaper 1, so much more to tell !
Getting High from 1968 on......
My childhood was full of trees and tall rocks, so itâ??s no surprise that when I started smoking I took to the heights. There were several heavily wooded glades around my childhood community where we would asend ten to fifteen feet above the ground and begin to pass the joint. Newcomers to the circle were often shocked when three or four of us would swing into the branches of some friendly pine tree and head up. Some folks just would not join us and would wait on the ground hoping we would drop the joint. The rule was if you dropped it you had to climb down and get it. More than occasionally someone would fall out of the tree after the sixth joint. Our friends learned how to wrap a leg onto place and be comfortable when they were high. We heard stories from the other folks at parties.
â??...Not only was the joint the size of a Lucky Strike and sweet but those maniacs had to climb thirty feet up in a tree to smoke it..â?
What these folks failed to appreciate was that mosquitoes donâ??t fly much above fifteen feet, so the higher we were the less we got bit.
Occasionally we got stoned in the local pastures and then there were the occasional bouts of cow tipping. Cow tipping is pretty funny, unless the pasture has an electric fence; then itâ??s hilarious. It isnâ??t easy to get four or five heavily stoned individuals to quietly push together on a eight hundred pound bovine, much less sneak up on it. But if you are lucky enough to get this far then the real fun begins; getting over the fence without being zapped. The cows know better than people how much that fence hurts and they will chase you right to the edge.
Collecting the mushrooms was a similar situation, but add headlamps and
paranoia.
In June of 1970 John and I were getting stoned in one of the trees on the town green. We had climbed almost thirty feet into an evergreen and the thick branches screened us from view. After the two if us had finished the third joint, and placed the roach carefully in the crotch of two branches, we noticed the local High School graduation was set up at the far end of the green. When the class president encouraged participation in the war in Viet Nam we began shouting from the tree top â??Drop Nixon Not Bombsâ? and â??Stop the Draftâ? After a bit they turned up the PA system and sent a cop over to our tree. Now John and I looked like a couple of hippies; tall, skinny, very long hair, scraggly beards, blue jeans, and army surplus t shirts. The poor cop they sent over was maybe five ten and well over two hundred fifty pounds. He was not a tree climber, and had not climbed any trees since he was ten or so. Eventually we came down and he lectured us about our behavior and appearance. After a while he got bored and we walked away.
In a state park in the county and we discovered a cave that overlooked a favorite bird watching trail. We could cram five or six people into this crack in the rocks and after a few joints it was hard to resist heckling the passing crowd. Eventually we decided on the bird call from the old â??George of the Jungleâ? cartoon. â??Auk, Auk; EEK, EEK; Tookie, Tookie!â?
Fortunately the entry and exit for this crack were concealed and not easily found. More than a few birdwatchers looked around for the source of this unusual chorus.
We also climbed many rocks, and our smoking trails would include face climbs of twenty and thirty feet. Several of our favorite trees were a mile or more into the local woods. We would play a twisted follow the leader with our friends.
â??Want to smoke a joint??â?
â??Sure!!â?
â??Follow me..........!â?
Rick and I knew the trails like the local deer and we would bound along. Most of our closer friends could keep up, but newbees or friends of friends sometimes had problems. Rick and Jeff and I would bound up a finger sized crack in a twenty foot wall and then wait for Tom and Shaun and the rest of them. Another quarter of a mile through the swamp and then up the branches of this magnificent ancient old oak. Thirty feet in the air at a fork and branch in the trunk that provides comfortable seating for ten. Above the bugs and swamp gas we had a magnificent view for miles. With the ocean in the distance and the three hundred year old church on the hill, we relaxed with a sea of green foliage shimmering all around us.
All of this was hard enough on the unsophisticated, then we threw in the Chilum. While traveling through Asia in the sixties I encountered some monks smoking hash from an upright pipe, held between the palms. Three small pebbles selected from the path provided a screen to support the hash. It took several tries but finally I understood, this device was a She Loom (Chilum). Now I understood the purpose for the object I had seen in so many market stalls, and when I next saw one I purchased it. Back in the States not too many people had seen one, and my brother and I enjoyed springing new paraphernalia on people after they were pretty high.
My brother and I had pretty good balance. We had been riding unicycles for ten years and now we were smoking with two hands balanced on a branch thirty feet up. Jeff would sit on Rickâ??s right and I always passed the pipe to Rick first. The three of us would try to show newcomers how to hold it properly, but not everyone listened. Jeff picked up pretty quick, but then he was with us six days a week. We made it look easy but then we had a lot of practice. Eventually someone would stick it in their face and burn their tongue, no matter how many times we warned them.
At one point we came into possession of a full face tear gas mask. After removing the carbon filter, but leaving the one way valves in place, we epoxied a glass funnel to the end of the canister and bored the stem of a briar pipe to fit the stem of the funnel. We also left the straps in place. You would load the bowl with five or six grams of weed then strap this on your head. When you had it securely in place you gave a thumbs up and someone would apply a flame to the bowl. Within a second or two the face piece filled with smoke and your eyes began to sting. You closed your eyes and tried to breathe, but more smoke came in. If you coughed or exhaled the one way valves kept the bowl from spilling and a puff of smoke would exhaust from the side. Three good lungs full and you had cashed the bowl. Of course by then you might need a little help getting the straps off and the mask released. Thatâ??s why it was only brought out when there were several people around, this was buddy smoking. After a night with this monster you would have a yellow resin ring on your face.
Chaper 1, so much more to tell !