Tripping

// Effed Up

By Jake Dubs .
12.07.09 // Tripping

After the toke everything is different. The world is small and complex and weird. No one exists except the 1,500 or so people I’ve met in my life. These are the players in my play. Everything is clearer, even though I can feel my brain becoming enveloped in a thick cloud of smoke. I look around the room and swing my focus around to the TV. For ten seconds I have no idea what I’m looking at. Then I realize Sportscenter’s on the screen. 20- and 30-something-year-old men running around in bright colors trying to push and tackle other men in bright colors. Or run away from them. Grown men with talent and athleticism only a tiny amount of people have ever had, playing games. It’s suddenly the most insanely ridiculous thing I’ve ever seen. And hundreds of millions of people around the world lose their shit over it, hanging on every moment of these other people’s lives. Human beings are so interested in each other they devote large chunks of their lives and their happiness to the success of others, their brains flicking into crazy mode when the team from their geographic area or college best a team from a different geographic area or college. Their pride runs so deep and is so meaningless and unnecessary. They do it for entertainment, to feel something, to have something, to be part of something bigger than themselves. Feeling depressed, I think my roommates are plotting to kill me. I go upstairs, sit in my computer chair and turn on some music. I apple-T it and the visualizer comes to life, sending waves of multi-colored light and spheres swirling around my screen. I think each sphere is a tiny little world, exploding one after the other. Maybe one of those spheres is or will be ours. The song I’m listening to is one I never liked, but now, this time, it’s the most mind-blowing thing I’ve ever heard in my life. Ever. I believe it was written and performed for me, for my life, at this exact moment. The lyrics are for me and no one else. I think there’s no God. I think life is meaningless. I think life is wonderful. I am confused. Everything is clear. I am totally in control. I am totally out of control. I’m the smartest person on earth. I’m the stupidest person on earth. I know I’m feeling and thinking conflicting things, and I’m simultaneously fine and not fine with this. In the back of my mind, I know the trip has grabbed hold of me. Suddenly, I think I’m dying. But aren’t we all?

View Comments / Dec 07.09 / Tripping / by Jake Dubs

// Don’t eat the celebratory candy corn.

By Ben Cheney .
12.05.09 // Tripping

Man wearing a black beanie cap that reads “SPORTS”: Lady, I feel weird.
Lady, seemingly a stranger: Oh, I’m sorry.
Man wearing a black beanie cap that reads “SPORTS”: No, I feel weird.  Like cake being squeezed through a Play-Doh Fun Factory.  I’m Play-Doh spaghetti made out of cake.
Lady, seemingly alarmed: Oh my.
Man wearing a black beanie cap that reads “SPORTS”: See, I took this weird looking candy from a lady that looked like the human incarnation of terror at 134th St and 7th Ave.  I didn’t know her, but she said they were candy corn in celebration of the Pilgrims coming to New York City five years ago.  I love the Pilgrims, but I’ve never had candy corn that makes me feel like I’m in a flying saucer.
Lady, seemingly intrigued: Sir, you are on the Subway, not in a flying saucer.  But do you have any more of those candy corns?

View Comments / Dec 05.09 / Tripping / by Ben Cheney

// Gonzo Baby

By Jordan Childs .
12.05.09 // Tripping

View Comments / Dec 05.09 / Tripping / by Jordan Childs

// History

By Tristan Smith .
12.04.09 // Tripping

History from Tristan Smith on Vimeo.

View Comments / Dec 04.09 / Tripping / by Tristan Smith

// The Miracle of Manchester

By Charles Hodges .
12.02.09 // Tripping

I went to the very first Bonnaroo the summer after my junior year of high school.  My best friend and I were huge Widespread Panic fans, and we had just found out that the lead singer was going to die of pancreatic cancer (R.I.P., Mikey).  Pancreatic cancer aside, it was an unbelievable lineup for my high school headiness: Phil Lesh, Gov’t Mule, Bela Fleck, Keller Williams, moe, String Cheese Incident, Trey Anastasio, Karl Denson’s Tiny Universe, Galactic, Ween, and, of course, Widespread Panic – just to name a few.

Our mothers had no idea that we were headed to what was being lauded as the modern day Woodstock.  I think they thought it was going to be more like one big camping trip, which in some ways it was.  They didn’t know what the hell we were about to get into.

But neither did we.

Throughout the nine hour journey from Charlotte, North Carolina to Manchester, Tennessee, we were extremely nervous because we were underage and had hidden four cases of Bud Light in our car.  Little did we know that we would be the least of the problems for Manchester’s Finest.

When we arrived and got in the three hour waiting line, we found out that they were checking for two things in your car: people that didn’t have a ticket and tanks of nitrous oxide.  When they searched our car, they found the beer.  We were flushed with anxiety.  We were going to spend the entire weekend in jail with three wookies who would be in there for selling nitrous.

The cop grabbed the beer, moved it to the side, lifted up the spare wheel, checked underneath it, then waved us through.

“Be safe,” the cops on horseback said.
“Thank you officer, you too,” I said back.

We pulled into our spot and found that we were parked next to a guy named Dan.  Dan was a twenty-three year old who was trying to grow a beard.  He installed cabinets in New Jersey.  When I asked him how his job was he said, “fun”.  He brought a guitar, although he told us he didn’t play it.  He had a lot of Jack Daniels.  He had come by himself.  He whistled himself to sleep.  He never took off his shoes.  Thoughts of being murdered crossed my mind.  I now know what it was like to sleep on a train during the dust bowl.

After we got settled, we decided to go check out the scene.

“Have you been to Shakedown?” a dude asked us.
“No, where is it?”
“That’s why I was asking you, bro!” the guys said before hacky sacking his way down the line of port-o-johns.

For those of you who haven’t been to numerous jam band concerts, “Shakedown” is short for “Shakedown Street”, the name of a famous Grateful Dead song.  In the parking of any of any of these concerts, Shakedown Street is usually the equivalent of a hippie farmers market.  However, Shakedown Street at the first Bonnaroo was more like a hippie Costco.  There were bongs the size of tricycles.  There were kids on tricycles holding bongs the size of tricycles.  There were blacklight posters of Jerry.  There were wood carvings of Jerry.  There were wooden bongs that looked like Jerry that glowed under black light.  One vendor was selling the three following items: bongs, dildos and pizza.  I didn’t see any sanitation grades.

But what about the drugs?  Well, they were actually kind of hard to find.  If you were Helen Keller.

Stalks of marijuana were sold by topless women who looked like poorly imitated Janis Joplins.  Mushrooms were sold as if someone was making a salad for a soup kitchen after a hurricane.  And acid doses were sold on sheets of paper, the dealer ripping them off like he was an acupuncturist giving away his business card at the worlds largest yoga class.  And we were worried about four cases of beer.

Now, we had been to numerous concerts in our day.  We had seen numerous lot scenes, “Shakedowns”, veggie burritos and ganja goo balls (don’t ask).  But we had never seen like this.  And the music hadn’t even started.

The first night we went to see String Cheese Incident play with Keller Williams.  Heady, no doubt.  We heard “Freaker By the Speaker” standing right next to the speaker.  Everything was cool, everyone grooving under the “harvest moon” of Tennessee.  Then, directly beside us, a guy just keeled over.  He started shaking and spitting up blood.  We were freaking out.  Then, like a wooked out Quail Man, his friend appeared.

“Dude!  Holy shit!  Oh man. It’s that acid.  It’s that acid.  It’s that acid.”

He was freaking out.  He was rubbing his forehead, while trying to make his friend sit up.  Then he said one of the most amazing things I have ever heard in my entire life.

“Dude, you need a cigarette.”

He proceeded to pull a pack of Marlboro Reds out and put one in his half-conscious friend’s mouth, and light it for him.  The amazing part?  It worked.  The dude walked back to his tent, or wherever he was going, under his own power.  It was a miracle.

After the show, we went back to our car.  Dan was there, holding his guitar, not playing it and generally just freaking out anyone who was sober enough to pay attention.

“How was the show?” Dan said.
“It was cool.  Saw some dude throw up blood,” I said.
“Oh, man, that’s crazy,” Dan said.
“Yeah, what’d you do?  Which concerts did you see?”
“Concerts?  Oh, I didn’t go see any concerts.”

We locked the doors of our car and went to sleep, because we had two more nights with all 100,000 of these people.

View Comments / Dec 02.09 / Tripping / by Charles Hodges

// You Can

By Joey Camire .
12.01.09 // Tripping

View Comments / Dec 01.09 / Tripping / by Joey Camire

// Am I Really Missing Anything?

By Alex Aloise .
11.30.09 // Tripping

I’m not going to come out and declare myself Straight Edge. I drink. I enjoy it. It can certainly add an extra element of fun to a night. But beyond the occasional sip of the spirits, my history of illicit activity is a blank slate. I’ve never smoked (tobacco or otherwise), never snorted, never shot up, never tried shrooms, nada.

Bottom line: I’ve never tripped. I’ve been asked many times why I won’t at least try it. My answer basically boils down to “I don’t feel like it.” I don’t see the point. I’m in no rush to heighten my experience or expand my existence. I like the life around me the way it is.

I’ve had friends who have tried one substance or another. Their experiences have ranged from developing a lifelong, violent fear of Killer Tomatoes all the way to claiming to see everything and everyone around them as a cartoon. While I’ll admit that the latter does sound pretty awesome, I’ve seen both of those Linklater movies where the whole world was strangely animated and neither one was anything more than Meh-worthy. Besides, more often than not I have a hell of time just hearing the stories after the fact.

So, I ask the question: Am I really missing anything? Would my life have more meaning if I forgot significant chunks of it from time to time? Would I feel more enlightened if I increased my “experience” count? Would I be a more interesting person if I took more trips? I seriously doubt it. I’m happy riding sidecar.

View Comments / Nov 30.09 / Tripping / by Alex Aloise