High and Low in the Sierra Nevada
By: B Owen Guthrie, Wedge
Tags: Music, Travel, Relationships, Psychedelics, Personal Growth

When is too much just right ?

Darla and I had decided after many months of back + forth, to make the 2500 mile journey to the concert/camping experience known as the Electric Frontier. We packed two huge Rubbermaid lockboxes with all our camping gear and then flew in to Laramie, WY and got a rental car for the 85 mile drive to Beacon Hill, site of the four-day festival, now in its 20th year.

A music festival is a completely different experience for several reasons, the two prime considerations being good neighbors and powerful psychotropics. Being the clever consumer that I am, we had bought an entire 50 grams of psilocybin mushrooms from a trusted source, freeze-dried them, and then ground it into a fine powder with which I then filled two 35 mm film containers. These two small but critical items were placed in the cardboard tube of a roll of paper towels and placed in the bottom of the Rubbermaid; easy-peasy & super breezy.

The line-up was all of our funk and jam band favorites, including Deep Banana Blackout, Beck, Turkuaz, Flaming Lips, Galactic, moe., & Sound Tribe Sector 9, among many other great names. We had purchased our wrist bands early, which not only allowed us to buy items at the festival but gave us preferred camping access. After quickly setting up camp and saying Hello to a few neighbors, we got ready for Night #1 with a few puffs, several cold beers, and a huge brownie. It would be a four-day marathon, and so I needed to start off easy. First night’s headliners were Wilco and Galactic (from New Orleans!) and we were ready to roll.

Of course, Galactic killed it and we retired early (about 3 am) after our long day of travel, to prepare for the first real day. The music went on all thru the night, either campfire jams or obnoxious random techno beats, but somehow we were able to rest well, and got up refreshed and recharged. The day promised to be heavy, with two of my favorites headlining, STS 9 and Turkuaz, so I put a little extra mushroom powder in my delicious strawberry smoothie, purchased with our handy wristbands from the FruitCup truck. A full ounce of dried fungus is probably enough for six or eight really good trips, so I did not skimp on the dosages. After adding two heaping teaspoons, I put in a third for good measure, like we do back home with coffee, hoping for a good long night of some funky wavy-gravy !

Two foggy, trippy hours later, I realized through my mental haze that I had probably taken way more than necessary. “Hey, D Baby, if I start to lose it, will you just kinda hold me till I come back, ok, Lover ?” The light of my life looked over at me and said, “You know I got you, Beanie Boy! Every time you reach out, you know I’ll be right there beside you. Now chill out and go enjoy yourself”.

Her eyes were not only sparkling and spinning, but were also brimming with the incredible happiness we’re able to make together. She was my woman and I was her guy and we were very happy together after 15 great months. Truly I adored this woman. We were both divorced and had been introduced by a mutual friend, and got on like peas and carrots, fitting like two fingers of the same glove.

I was really buzzing, I mean everything was either vibrating, glowing, or communicating with me on several different levels. High af and dancing around like a spastic meth-head on a grand mal seizure, I was just enjoying the shit out of that moment in time, feeling like I was exactly where I was supposed to be doing exactly what I was supposed to be doing. I was literally scurrying around high-fiving strangers, jumping over their blankets, and just having a heckuva lot of big fun. Since all good things must inevitably come to an end, on one of my passes through the approving crowd, a young “security guard” stood and blocked my revelry. “Hey there Big Guy, waddya say we settle down a bit & quit all this showing off, ok ? Just chill out for a minute & stop embaras- sing yourself, comprende ?” I was having not one tiny bit of that nonsense, none. So I cleverly responded with, “How’s about you jump up my butt, Junior. See, this here wrist-band I got grants me admission to this gathering and so I therefore have every right to be here. Buh bye!” and I was off again on my psychedelic perambulations which I felt were not only exhilarating & life-enhancing, but perfectly appropriate and reasonable.

Apparently, Junior didn’t quite see it that way because on my next pass, he was reinforced by a state trooper who looked not pleased at all. He put out his left hand to stop me, while his right gently slid down to unlock his handcuffs. “Hey Son,” he began, “what exactly seems to be your particular problem because my associate here tells me you failed to comply with his directive,and I don’t cotton to such insubordination. If you feel compelled to persist inthis behavior, let me reassure you that I have both the remedy & the will to bring you into compliance. Are you understanding me there, boy ?”

Since I was in fact tripping out of my own head, I heard the words but they conveyed no meaning and I began to laugh uncontrollably, like a freshman frat boy on three extra strength hash brownies.

“Son, do you need to spend the night in my custody to understand that I am not one to be toyed with, especially by the likes of a puke like you ?”

Of course, it was now impossible for me to control my hysteria, because his face had become unbearably amusing and hideous, and all I could think about was Mahatma Gandhi finding peace in jail after he was arrested. So as he menacingly tore at his cuffs, I gladly offered my wrists to be shackled, all the while nearly crying with maniacal guffawing at his futile attempts at intimidation. He seemed quite comfortable with his aggressive demeanor and expected the subservience which I was not prepared to offer. He seemed to playing one game and I another. His was “Big Boss Man”, but mine was called, “Tweaked out hippie messes with Officer Un-Friendly”. There I was in the back of the squad car, handcuffed, shirtless, sweaty and dirty, and relishing every moment of my imagined super- iority over this over-zealous civil servant. My frontal lobe was trying unsuccess- fully to navigate the hallucinogenic haze of my “consciousness”, as I mentally grappled with enough drugs for a trio of fat guys. I was in bliss, singing and asking him all kinds of silly and annoying questions, just completely out of my mind, but not minding it one bit. I laughed and harassed him the entire twenty minuteride back to the county jail, not caring about a thing other than savoring each moment as something special and not to be ignored. I heard him conveying to Dispatch that he needed the Drunk Tank ready for an overnight guest. He finally could not handle it any longer, and told me, “Let’s see if your stupid ass feels any different in the morning, Boy, when you wake up in my house !” He parked and slammed his door, pulling me out by my cuffed hands with much more force than was necessary, and double-timed me directly to the Tank. For the next four or five hours, I unleashed more than just mere verbal blasts; these were laser- guided Cruise missiles, intended to rile, annoy, provoke, and demoralize the enemy. The tirade consisted of insults, nonsense, accusatory insinuations, and just plain indecipherable banter stronger and sharper than ever before heard in that fine establishment. Every once in a while, I would hear a comment and a chuckle so I knew they were listening. But when I heard someone tell me toshut up and go to sleep, I just continued to ramble on perfectly at peace, until that first terrifying moment when the powerful molecules began to relinquish their air-tight grip on my brain. I could feel myself slipping back down to Earth,as slowly and uncomprehendingly, I became of where I was and the conditions under which I awoke. It was very cold and I was very thirsty, and more than a little bit afraid of what I had said or done the day and night before, now that I was almost myself once more.

I lightly tapped on the glass around 5:30 am, and when the matronly desk clerk came to the window, she said, “What’s wrong, Buttercup ? If you think that after last night, you are getting anything other than this finger, you got another think coming. After all your speechifying last night, I’d be surprised if you’re outta here by Wednesday, Cupcake!” she offered gleefully.

I meekly and politely asked for a blanket and a glass of water, and so when she just laughed and turned away, I went to the only other source of water in my cell, and drank deeply from the stainless steel toilet with relish until I was sated.

Around 10:20 am, Darla came and paid my $1,100 bail, and we drove to Jackson Hole to say, “I do”. And twenty-two years later, we are still side by side and all-in for the long haul.