What A Trip

Albert Hofmann remembers very clearly the moment when, on a spring afternoon, riding his bicycle, the whole world - and his life - changed.

"Everything in my field of vision wavered and was distorted as if seen in a curved mirror," says the chemist, who celebrates his 100th birthday tomorrow. "I had the feeling that I could not move from the spot. I was cycling, cycling, but the time seemed to stand still." It was 1943, and Hofmann was experiencing the world's first LSD trip.

This article is dope! Ha ha, no, seriously, this is a good read. For those that did not know the history of LSD, it was used primarily, after discovery, in the treatment (and understanding of) psychotic disorders.

I've taken a few acid trips. None of them, mind you, in the 60's, when the rest of my counterpart baby boomers were doing drugs. I didn't begin experimenting with drugs until I was 24 years old, and an adult. I do not advocate, and I do not approve of, drug use by adolescents, or children. But, I am not opposed to adults using recreational drugs. End of story.

Back to LSD, though. Actually, my first trip was not off LSD, but MDA, in 1977, in Hollywood. To induce the onset of the effects, I walked around the block, Hollywood Blvd. residential district area, west of La Brea. I peaked sometime thereafter. It was an interesting first trip. I was attending one of those typical Hollywood dinner parties, with the guest list an intriguing mix of artists, actors and musicians. You know, the ones with the five course meal, and a different wine with each course. I puked at the end of the evening, and most of the trip was uneventful.

My second MDA trip (before I used LSD) was in Northern San Diego County, and was by far, the most fun. It was a day trip, spent with the same person I took the MDA the first time in Hollywood. I remember when I peaked, Amtrak was going by. The silver of the train streamed for way longer than the train was actually there!

The fun part was exploring the communities of Encinitas and Leucadia. We actually discovered a tree house, that really had electricity wired into it, and a "dude" lived in the house. We climed up the tree and surprised the "dude" and pretty much told him we were "tripping" and could we just sit in his house and enjoy it. Back in the 70's people were cool to that.

My first LSD trip was actually very funny. I had been dating a comic, and hung out with comics. We were given a tab of Goofy (that's a piece of paper with the mark of the Disney character Goofy stamped on it) and told it was great stuff. My date and I took it and zero happened. The next morning we hooked up with the rest of the comedic group, and they asked us how we thought the stuff was. We figured they gave us bogus LSD and were trying to see if we had a trip anyway. We called them on it, and my friends were rather perplexed. They indicated it was great stuff, and before I knew it, one had pulled out this small vial, and dropped a few drops in my mouth, and said "there, try THAT." The rest of the group laughed, and took a few drops. In about fifteen minutes, I began the most extreme trip I'd ever had.

The only problem was ... it was moving day. Yup, the guys and I were all prepared to move me out of my apartment that day. Ha ha ha. Yes, we all were on acid moving. The long story short, I couldn't find the apartment I was moving to, and it took weeks to track down my furniture that had been loaded up and driven away!

I enjoyed tripping with a few friends over the latter part of the 70's, including once on Thanksgiving. We always took low doses so that we just got the giggles and saw "pretty colors." The last time I did LSD was on my 30th birthday. I was still living at the beach, and we had an open house. It was still very much the drug culture era circa Studio 54, so, at my birthday open house, I had a bowl of Goffy tabs of acid, a bowl of cocaine, an ice bucket full of bottles of champagne, and joints rolled. It was an all day open house, and oh, what a house I had, with glass windows overlooking the Pacific Ocean.

Ah, youth ...