DOSE:
smoked
Cannabis
smoked
PCP
BODY WEIGHT:
140 lb
[Erowid Note: Some authors report suspicions that their cannabis has been 'laced' (adulterated), in some cases, presumably with PCP. While this is possible, readers should be aware that idiosyncratic response to the effects of cannabis (usually higher doses) can lead some users to presume their cannabis has been 'laced'. There is no way to know if the cannabis in the report below was adulterated or not. Reports of plant material and cannabis laced with powerful synthetic cannabinoids and other psychoactive substances became more common starting in 2007.]
My friends and I drove eight hours to see a Phish show. I am a huge fan of their music, whether I'm chemically altered or not. I'm also a huge fan of being foolish and over-indulging in whatever I can get my hands on from time to time.
In the trunk of the car was an entire cooler of beer, and I was sitting in the backseat. J was in the passenger seat, and R was driving - she was staying sober for the driving, which was good. Being in the backseat, I still had access into the trunk, so I kept pulling beers out of the cooler in our trunk, handing one to J and keeping one for myself each time then stashing the empties in a lunchbox in the backseat. We started drinking at seven in the morning, an hour or so after we got out of town and onto the highway, and continued drinking the whole trip. On top of that, J and I split eight or nine muscle relaxers between the two of us, we smoked a few bowls of the really nice kush we'd been saving for the trip (smoking mids in the weeks leading up to the show was horrible), and J had a can of duster he got me to hit a few times. I'm not a fan of duster in general, but I will admit that while listening to the Oysterhead and Zappa, it was an interesting experience.
We got to the lot some time between two and three, got good parking, and went immediately in search of tickets. J and I were pretty drunk, but R was still stubbornly remaining sober. It was ninety degrees that day, and I remember thinking how bad an idea the beer had been since I was going to be walking around on the lot, so I compromised by walking around with a PBR in each pocket and a bottle of water in my hand.
We got towards the front of the venue, having turned down some seated tickets to the side of stage, wanting general admission in front of the stage and willing to pay over face for said tickets. A lady in the box office working will call called us over and said that there were still general admission tickets unspoken for that had been re-released that day. We happily bought these for face value, sans Ticketmaster fees and everything.
We walked around the lot for a while, and considered purchasing some Molly. When the guy showed it to us, it was brown, and I definitely didn't feel like taking sass on top of everything already in my system, so I passed on it.
J sold the remainder of his strip of acid in the hopes of being able to purchase something more, but as the day wore on and the start time of the concert came closer, it became pretty clear that we were stuck with what we had.
Walking in, a random guy offered to split a chocolate with mushrooms with J, and J accepted. I'd decided I didn't really want to trip, that I wanted to chill out and just smoke some pot and enjoy the tunes. I felt horrible having wandered around drunk in the heat all day, had finally sobered up and gotten hydrated, and just wanted to enjoy the concert.
We got into general admission and wound up three or four people back, right in front of where the bassist, Mike Gordon, would be playing. I would have preferred to be closer to Trey or Page, but J demanded Mike side. I talked to the people around me as we waited for Phish to take the stage, and they were all really nice people and I was happy to be around such good folks.
Phish came out and launched into 'Kill Devil Falls'. It was a new song, but we all were really digging it and dancing. Next came one of my favorites, 'Sample In a Jar', and as the first verse went into the chorus, a guy behind me tapped me on the shoulder. I turned around, and saw that he was holding a bowl out to me. I thanked him and took a hit.
It didn't taste right, and it seemed kind of crackly in comparison to weed I'd been smoking. I was convinced the guy just had really shitty weed, and he looked pretty nerdy so it seemed a reasonable assumption.
He passed it back to me after he took his next hit, and I took that hit also, pretty sure that he was just sharing with me because I was a girl at a Phish show who appeared to bathe. I was already starting to feel a little high from those two hits, and I thought that was weird, but kept passing back and forth with the guy anyway. We finished two bowls by the time the band was midway through the third song, 'Ocelot', and my friends told me we were going to try to move up even more. I turned to the guy and handed him a rolled joint of the kush, apologized that I wouldn't be able to smoke that with him, and told him to enjoy the show before following my friends closer to center.
We ended up still a few rows back, only now we were pretty much in between Trey and Mike. The sound was actually a lot better in this location, and I was kind of happy we'd moved. I felt amazingly stoned, and kind of weird, numb, and tingly. I took a drink of my water, then almost fell flat on my back.
J grabbed me as I started to fall and asked what was wrong, before noticing that I was covered in sweat and my pupils were insane. 'That...wasn't pot.' I managed to say. He'd not noticed that I'd been smoking with someone else, but looked back towards the guy.
'That guy?' he said, and I nodded.
'He's the dude who tried to sell me PCP earlier...you are going to be completely out of your mind in a few minutes.'
I just nodded like I understood, but already wasn't sure that I did. J was holding me up, and I noticed that most people in the vicinity weren't looking at the show; they were looking at me, a twitchy, sweaty mess being held up by my friend. I looked up at the stage, and it seemed that even Mike was keeping an eye on me.
R leaned over to me to check my pulse, and informed me that my heart was going really fast, but that I was going to be cool. I just nodded again, and kept looking at the stage, unable to feel my own heart beating or much of anything but the tingling all over my face and body.
I vaguely remember the next two or three songs they played, but by the time they went into 'The Curtain With', a rarity I would have been stoked to hear under other circumstances, I don't think I was hearing the same music as everyone else. For some reason, I thought they were playing 'The Man Who Stepped Into Yesterday', a song I really wanted to hear but was most decidedly different from the song currently playing.
For the remainder of the first set, I was wigging out a lot. I thought that Trey was trying to send me the setlist through ESP and kept telling everyone, 'They're playing Icculus next. I know it. Trey's trying to tell me.'
During the last song of the set, (which I was later told was 'Time Turns Elastic') I had to sit down. I just sat down on the ground of general admission, curled up with my knees to my chin. I vaguely heard someone in the vicinity tell R or J that I probably needed to get out of there because I was obviously not doing well. J tried to help me up to get me out, but I wasn't having any of it. I was convinced they just thought I wasn't having fun, so I sprang to my feet with energy that probably surprised me as much as anyone around me, and began dancing wildly.
J was tripping at this point, but R was sober, and also not a huge fan of Phish in the first place, so she kept an eye on me. I got someone near me to start dancing with me, far too exuberantly for the song playing, and was finally led outside at set break to get some more water.
I sat on the ground just outside, watching the people going around me. I turned to J and informed him that I was at my eighth grade bonfire. I knew it was my eighth grade bonfire for a fact, and pointed out my classmates to him. He just nodded and made me drink the water.
I wasn't doing much better when we got back inside. I felt weird, confused, and had no idea where I was. We ended up closer to Trey this time, but a few more rows back. We were still extremely close to the stage, however.
I danced to the first four songs of the set, before sitting back down. I felt really sick and was sweating profusely. I couldn't feel my arms, legs, face, or much of anything for that matter. I was certain I was dying, but I decided that was completely okay. Phish launched into 'Wilson', a definite audience sing-a-long, and I again sprang to my feet, screaming, 'Wilson!' with the rest of the crowd.
It may be noteworthy at this point to mention that Phish have some of the most intense concert lighting you will ever see. During the next song, 'Also Sprach Zarathustra', they actually light the entire arena up from the stage at a climactic moment.
When this happened, I was dancing wildly once again, only to be overwhelmed by the lights. I felt my entire body explode, and suddenly I was disassembled into atoms. I watched myself as I was carried with the wind and energy, rested a moment on Trey's guitar, and was sent back into the audience, whole again. I knew then that Phish had disassembled and reassembled me, making me stronger and better. I think I may have started to cry. The people behind me were holding me up, and I babbled the nonsense about how Phish had just saved my life, and these complete strangers hugged me and told me everything was going to be okay from this point on. I believed them.
The rest of the concert passed pretty much in a blur. I was still twitchy and fidgety and numb. J handed me a packed bowl, hoping that the pot would calm me down. Not surprisingly, it only managed to intensify and prolong the effects.
When we left the concert, I had no idea where I was going, but for some reason R and J allowed me to lead. For some indiscernible reason, I went the opposite way the rest of the crowd was going before coming to a fence.
A fellow fan and I tore the gate off of the fence like it was nothing, and proceeded to walk into the fenced area. R and J later told me it was backstage. I think I was vaguely aware of that at some point, as I saw the loading dock and such, but I was convinced I was in the right place.
A large crowd of fans began to follow us, and we made it across the backstage area before coming to a set of broken-down bleachers up against a 12-15 foot fence. There was no other way out except for going back the way we had come or jumping this fence. I opted for climbing the bleachers to jump the fence, and the others all followed suit.
There were hundreds of us now, and somehow I remembered that I'd led them here. I didn't remember being much of a leader, so I was completely overwhelmed. People began jumping, landing safely, and I made sure R and J got over safely before I jumped so they'd know I wasn't leaving them. As soon as they landed, something strange happened in my head.
Nothing looked right anymore, nor did it look remotely like an urban area. I realized that I'd led this group of people to Hell, and they were jumping into a pit to see which circle of Hell they belonged in. It was all my fault. As I looked down, I couldn't tell if it was people or corpses looking up at me from below.
J said my name and I snapped back to reality with the realization that I was somehow standing balanced on top of the fence. People were jumping all around me, and most of the people who had landed were standing at the bottom, looking up at me. From atop the fence, I looked out beyond the people and noticed the band's bus with figures in the window, looking right at me. From the vicinity of the bus came a Phish security guard (not event security; clear distinction) on a golf cart.
'Get off the fence, you animals!' he exclaimed at us laughing, shining a flashlight up at my face. I looked again to the tour bus, and the figures were still looking out the windows. Finally, I jumped.
I landed beside the golf cart, and J and R grabbed my arms and began leading me to the car. I was still out of it when we got into the car, and on the 45 minute drive to our hotel. I don't really remember falling asleep, but I assume it happened at some point after getting back to the hotel.
I felt a little out of it on the way back the next morning after waking up, even declining pot on the way back. When I got home, I went straight to rehearsals for a play I was in and was finally starting to feel a little better. I didn't remember much of anything about the concert (still don't) but I knew that PCP during a show was not an experience I'd like to repeat.
Exp Year: 2009ExpID: 86357 Gender: Female Age at time of experience: 21 Published: May 4, 2013Views: Not Supported [ View PDF (to print) ] [ View LaTeX (for geeks) ] [ Swap Dark/Light ]
PCP (113), Cannabis (1) : First Times (2), Difficult Experiences (5), Festival / Lg. Crowd (24) -->