School was wrapping up and I was finishing strong despite spending more time on the river than studying on the quiet third floor in those cubicles under the fluorescent lighting that was common to the library. I had not smoked any weed since February and I was not really casually drinking…for the most part. That’s not the point of the story though, that is just context. I had befriended the 125 boys at my dorm in the fall. They were my first friends I made out in Montana. They were not the best influence on me but at that time I just needed friends and I needed to laugh. Ben, is a tall slender California boy with an affinity for drinking (now a devout Catholic). Drew who is now in Utah is a big dude who loves ice cream. And it’s no surprise that he is a heavy weight when it comes to both alcohol and caffeine. Evan was this tall weed-loving Ohioan and loved the Cleveland browns more than anyone I had ever met. Nick was a 6’4 skier who hates school but loves learning about mushrooms to an extent that he started growing them in his dorm. I know some say you can’t get addicted to weed… but that man definitely is. And then there’s Nate. An adventure seeker who hails from Illinois. He loves backpacking and getting lost in the mountains…as well as the sauce (he has also changed in that regard). It is no surprise I got drunk for the first time when we went up to Hylite for some camping. Nor is it surprising that I greened out another time. I am a lightweight when it comes to just about everything. During the last week of school there was this buzz in air in the dorms. It reminded me of being in first or second grade when it is the last day of school. Pure excitement. Friends were planning trips and I was about to go on a road trip with some other friends I met. I get a text from Nick and he gives me a little present for the road. 2 grams of dorm-grown mushrooms. It freaked me out a little bit but it was also exciting. I was not really that rebellious in high school. I hid them at the very bottom of a sleepytime tea box and put the tea bags over it. Brought them home and waited. I decided to take them on an impulsive whim. I was not in a good head space. It was a Friday night and I had gotten back from a slightly toxic meal with my sisters and mom. Family can be messy. I had just gotten in a fight with my little sister too over something dumb that I definitely instigated. So, naturally I got home and I sit down. Open my mystery box and take out all the tea bags. I set down the ziplock bag those weird little fragments of consciousness were in and thought about it for a second. It was about 9 PM. I don’t know what drove me to do it right then and there. Was it an escape, an open curiosity, or a blind ignorance of what I was getting into. “It’s just two grams” I was probably thinking. That’s no hero dose. It will probably just be like weed but a little different…I will just read my bible and journal. Whatever that mixture of motives was, it was enough to get me to pick up one of the funky looking stems, and I put that bad boy in my mouth. Strangely, they didn’t even taste bad at all like I had mentally prepared for. After about 30 mins. I went and took a shower. For some reason I decided to turn the lights off and take it in the dark. I turned the water on, waited til it was hot and got in. Everything was normal for a minute and then I started seeing visuals. One was a man’s silhouette and another was these weird patterns. And the one that really scared me was a dark presence and then I saw a spirit that was certainly demonic. It sent chills down my spine and all I could do was watch. It just embodied evil to a point I had never imagined. That made me get out and turn on the lights. That was a relief because it made the visuals stop. Something in me decided to go back in… dark. So I go back into the shower and just feel the endless water stream down from my head to my toes. There’s no telling how much time I was in the shower but I would guess between 5 mins and 45 mins. I got out and dried off. Put on some clothes and walked over to my bed. I had my journal out and I wrote what little I could about that weird shower. Then I sat in my bed. I started getting freaked out because it was way more intense than I thought it would be. I was also worried that one of my parents would come down stairs because I was definitely and clearly tripping. I closed my eyes and put on some music and the weird patterns came back and I just watched them. Then after some time I opened my eyes and my blanket was moving and so I took a deep breath and continued on my journey. It just kept getting more and more intense. I opened my eyes again and things in my room looked reeeallly weird. Then another time I opened my eyes and couldn’t see my room and I saw this vortex and then I decided I would close my eyes for a while because opening them wasn’t helping. The feeling would come in waves and was very intense. After contemplating death for a while I thought briefly about God. This blew my mind because it was matched with patterns that just got bigger, I don’t really know what word to describe besides infinite. The more I let go the better it got. I think I was close to an ego death, but not quite there. Either way it was a humbling experience. Curled up in your bed at 2 or 3 in the morning acutely aware of how small you really are.  Eventually I started to come down and I was so relieved because I had no idea when that was coming. And then with the sunlight peeking through my window at 8 or so in the morning, I was able to fall asleep.