October Newsletter: A New Drug To Take
By Clay Allen

In August, they called me Mr. Sometimes. Sometimes working, sometimes writing, sometimes a this, sometimes a that. Always a sometimes. It had a glib ring that made me smile.

I would sometimes go and visit with my friend Hair. He directed me in a movie once, because sometimes I’m an actor. Hair thrashes full time at his consciousness and perception. He has clearly stated his mission, which is to travel to the River of Death, grab a handful of sand and try to slip out unnoticed. Thus, there isn’t a drug he hasn’t tried.

There are several drugs I won’t try.

In August, Hair reported his discovery of a new hallucinogen. It was called Salvia Divinorum, though he and his friends called it "Spit." This is part of Hair’s forty-five minute description of Salvia’s effects:

"You don’t trip when you take this drug. It’s not like acid or shrooms. You don’t look at a swurly wall and go ‘Whoooooa, it’s working! Trippy!" No. You are transported to the spirit world. Literally. You leave your surroundings and spend five to ten minutes in total wonder and awe at the New World around you. As you are just beginning to understand the parameters of this New World, the fog lifts and all you can think is ‘Where the fuck was I just then and what kind of stupid shit did my body do while I was there?’"

He also mentioned that Salvia is legal and can be purchased over the internet.

Please note: I have never been burned by legal pot, ecstasy or mushrooms. The lowest I’ve ever sunk for a legal buzz is taking ephedra and ma haung in high doses to stay awake while driving.

Hair mentioned that he was done with ecstasy forever. Spit, he said, provided the insights X never did. It was clean, easy and legal and though the trip was short, it was exceedingly meaningful and without unpleasant after effects.

As directed, I went to the www.sagewisdom.org. There I learned many things.

Salvia is a species of sage originally found only in the Sierra Madre region of Oaxaca, Mexico. It was used in sacred rituals by healers, patients and seekers. It reveals the fabric of the universe and can send the user propelling through time and space.

Salvia can be smoked, chewed or swished. Smoking is the easiest and cleanest method but the effects only last 5 to 10 minutes. Chewing has longer but less powerful effects and is considered the least cost effective. Swishing produces the longest and most intense results. It’s most similar, they say, to the ancient mystic experience. The drug comes in liquid form and is mixed with grain alcohol. You dilute a few droppers of it with a few droppers of water and hold it in your moth for fifteen minutes. The drug is then ingested by sublingual absorption, mostly beneath the tongue.

They have all the necessaries for sale if you want to give it a shot.

As a sometimes seeker of spiritual enlightenment, I ordered an ounce of the Sage Goddess Emerald Essence for $115. It would be enough for six very strong doses. You never know.

I arranged a trial run with Collins. I figured that at a low dose we might together glimpse the fabric of our love. If nothing else, it’d be a fun date.

It was just September now, the air still hot and America intact. I threw pillows on the floor and closed the blinds. We mixed the tincture, clinked glasses and threw the potion into our mouths.

What isn’t mentioned about sublingual ingestion is the incredible discomfort caused by the grain alcohol. Its purpose in the mixture is to burn holes in soft tissue through which the drug can be absorbed. It hurts something awful.

As the drug took effect, I drifted into the kind of thinking you have immediately after you wake up from a long, vivid dream. I could feel a pull at my middle. The painting I was looking at began to accumulate enormous depth that, by my math, would soon grow to include me. As I was just getting excited about this prospect, Collins nudged me and pointed to the clock. It was time to spit out what was now a mouthful of black putrescence. There followed a frantic search anything to put in our mouths that would eliminate the old-bus-seat taste from our mouths.

And that was about it. It was a glimpse, to be sure. I made plans to experience the full ride sometime in the near future. Sometime after my mouth healed.

Sometime after those dark, horrible days, we beat it to the old house in Wisconsin. Once it was my grandparents’ dream house, designed, built and decorated with love in 1967 and perfectly preserved. I lived there for a few months last year after Dot had passed. It’s a place of great magic. We decided we could use some.

We spent quiet days moving softly through the house and the woods. We made soups and grilled meat. We had sex in the morning under the weight of several knit blankets. We fell more in love with each other and back in love with the world.

It seemed a good time for a second look. This time I would take a dose that promised a high level experience. I was hoping for answers of any kind.

I set the alarm for 5:50 am. Collins and I would rise and beat the sun. It was a new day in a new month. The newness felt good; the crisp air of Wisconsin’s October held not a hint of decay. It was only autumn and dearly we welcomed it.

In the dim blue of pre-dawn we made preparations. I built a small fire of driftwood I’d collected from the beach and Collins prepared the potion. I opted for the "staggered dose method" as outlined in the pamphlet, hoping it would be easier on my mouth. Three doses of three droppers each held beneath the tongue for four minutes.

It came on and I thought, "Fantastic, it’s working!" and then quickly, "Shit, it can’t be working that well if I can sit here and realize it’s working." The itchy sweater of inconsequential thoughts unraveled quickly from there.

I watched the fire and it began to spell the word "BECAUSE" in block letters of flame. "Because why?" I thought. BECAUSE, the fire burned back, and then it was gone. I noticed the angle of the burning wood; for a split second I became the angle of the burning wood. Then Collins angled through my peripheries and I became distracted. I felt selfish for making her baby-sit me like this. What was the point? What knowledge was I gaining? Sure, strange things happened in my head and before my eyes, but to the best of my knowledge, the spirit world was not revealing itself to me. It’s probably my fault. Since when does Mr. Sometimes deserve a vision quest? And what good would come of it anyway?

An hour or so later, we were walking a deeply quiet path through the yellow woods. Mable, Collins' brown lab only four months in the world, sprinted in front of us. She stopped, turned and struck a pose of extreme anticipation. It was as if our approach was dependent on her concentration. With every step she was thinking, "That’s it, closer, closer..." When we finally reached the dog, she again sprinted ahead, this time over a leafy hill. We held hands and waited to be again in the powerful tractor beam of a pup’s attention. We were a few miles from the house, now, which sits a dozen miles from the town, which is hundreds of miles from real life. We were right where I always wanted to be. I hoped we’d never turn around.