col 49: lsd, trp, xtc & 'shrooms

[lorentzen-nicklaus]

 ~~~ meanwhile in schizonesia ~~~ voices through the doors of perception ~~~  
 "the bridge, die brücke, being his pet name for the experiment he was helping  
 the community hospital run on  effects of lsd-25, mescaline, psilocybin and  
 related drugs on a large sample of suburban housewifes. the bridge inward" (p. 
 10, picador edition) ~~~ also a ref to the famous german art-community  
 (kirchner, heckel, pechstein etc) with the same name?! ~~~ on may 6, 1967, tom 
 donahus wrote in billboard: "there are only two constants in the san francisco 
 hippie scene: music, grass and lsd" ~~~ quoting this from charles perry's  
 history of haight-ashbury from 1984, where i also found a leary saying that 
 fits into the tv & god debate, also to "the late, late, late show"-sculpture 
 from the watts essay: "lsd was a 'chemical door' through which you could leave 
 the 'fake-prop-television-set america' and find the garden of eden" (p. 278)  
 ~~~ writing down "the garden of eden", i, suddenly, feel reminded of trp's  
 enthusiastic mdma statement: "the circuits of the brain which mediate alarm,  
 fear, flight, lust and territorial paranoia are temporarily disconnected. you  
 see everything with total clarity, undistorted by animalistic urges. you have  
 reached a state which the ancients have called nirvana, all seeing bliss" ~~~  
 thanks, tom, this is beautiful ~~~ since otto just mentioned the psycholytic  
 work of stanislav grof, i may add that contemporary therapeutic work of this  
 kind (see, especially, samuel widmer: ins herz der dinge lauschen. vom erwachen 
 der liebe. über mdma und lsd: die unerwünschte psychotherapie. solothurn 1989: 
 nachtschatten) sometimes works with the mixture of mdma and lsd  (or 
 psilocybin) ~~~ "the synergistic effect of mdma and lsd 
 can be quite useful in lsd-assisted therapy", as bruce eisner writes in his xtc 
 story ~~~ mescaline, by the way, is really hard to get here ~~~ perhaps it's  
 a little easier in amsterdam ~~~ follows one of oedipa's possible futures in  
 case she would have taken the acid: "es war während der mittagspause, die ich 
 unter strenger klausur - keine besucher, sekreteriat geschlossen - in meinem 
 büro regelmäßig einzuhalten pflegte. da klopfte jemand diskret, aber beharrlich 
 an meine tür, bis ich sie schließlich öffnete. ich traute meinen augen kaum: 
 vor mir stand eine sehr schöne, junge frau, blond, mit großen blauen augen, in 
 langem hippie-gewand, mit stirnband, in sandalen. 'i am jane, i come from new 
 york - you are dr. hofmann?' etwas verblüfft fragte ich sie, wie sie durch die 
 beiden kontrollen, am haupteingang des fabrikareals und beim hausportier, 
 durchgekommen sei, denn besucher werden nur nach telephonischer rückfrage 
 eingelassen, und dieses blumenkind hätte besonders auffallen müssen. 'i am an 
 angel and can pass everywhere' - ich bin ein engel und habe überall durchgang. 
 sie komme in hoher mission, erklärte sie dann. sie müsse ihr land, die 
 vereinigten staaten retten, indem sie zuerst den präsidenten (damals l.b. 
 johnson) auf den rechten weg weisen müsse. [in the "jahrestage", by the way, 
 uwe johnson makes a lot of fun about having the same name. kfl]. das könne nur 
 so geschehen, indem man ihn veranlasse, lsd zu nehmen. das würde ihm die 
 richtigen gedanken eingeben, die es ihm ermöglichten, das land aus krieg und 
 inneren schwierigkeiten herauszuführen. sie sei zu mir gekommen, damit ich ihr 
 helfe, ihren auftrag, dem präsidenten lsd zu geben, auszuführen. ihr name - 
 jane - johanna, sage es: sie sei die jeanne d'arc der usa ... [leaving out a 
 longer part where albert hofman, of whose "lsd - mein sorgenkind", stuttgart 
 1979: klett, here pp. 213f, i'm quoting this, is trying to bring jane off from 
 her silly plan and gets her a job in a bar, where she played piano and sang 
 acid-inspired "hippie-lieder"] ... das zürcher gastspiel dauerte nicht lange; 
 es waren erst wenige wochen vergangen, als ich von meinem freund erfuhr, daß 
 jane plötzlich  verschwunden sei. drei monate später erhielt er einen 
 kartengruß aus israel. sie war dort in eine psychiatrische klinik eingeliefert 
 worden" ~~~ and so it can go ~~~ better pray for shelter when psychedelica are 
 among your ways of losing the armor ~~~ psilocybin, which burroughs (see, for  
 example, "la iguana", written in 1964: "lsd is not good. the plants are much 
 better", quoted in re-translation from page 121 of the german story 
 collection "die alten filme", augsburg 1979: maro) prefered to lsd, gets, these 
 days, legally sold in some german (european?) head shops. well, kind of legally 
 ~~~ what they actually offer are "smelling-pillows" (duftkissen) which contain 
 'shrooms of the species stropharia cubensis (grown in mexiko) or coppelandia 
 cyanescens (grown on hawei) ~~~ (they use, by the way, the same trick in 
 switzerland to sell weed legally) ~~~ well, those of you familiar with 'shrooms 
 know that their smell, though earthy and strong, is not exactly of the kind one 
 would take to lighten up the house olfactorically (these days i use "adi da 
 rasa, incense, avabhasa (the 'bright') rose"), so this might sound like a bad 
 commercial idea; actually it is not ~~~ on these "smelling-pillows" 
 you will always find the sentence "nicht zum verzehr geeignet!!" (not for 
 eating!!); i guess that's how they bypass the law. before he takes your money 
 and wishes you a nice day, the clerk sometimes says: "we have to tell you that 
 it's probably against the betäubungsmittelgesetz to open up the pillows and  
 eat the mushrooms". oh well, who could ever come on such an absurd idea?! ~~~ 
 see, in this context, also r.e. schultes/albert hofmann: plants of the gods ~~~ 
 ~~~ kinda german counterpart to huxley's doors of perception/heaven and hell is 
 ernst jünger's "annährungen. drogen und rausch", stuttgart 1970: klett, though 
 jünger deals with all kind of drugs ~~~ ernst jünger, as you might remember, 
 started as a right-wing author in the weimar republic and took part in the 
 assasination of rathenau (gr-related!); later he made a kind of heidegger-like 
 anarcho-turn, which, perhaps, has also to do with psycholytic experiences he  
 had with the help of mescalin, lsd, and psilocybin ~~~ he knew gurdjieff and  
 huxley personally and was friend of albert hofmann with whom he was trippin'  
 now and then ~~~ even theweleit, who, as readers of "männerphantasien" [hi  
 phil!] know, really hates jünger, admitted elsewhere that "annährungen" is a  
 good book and added: "even this solid armor got cracked-up by lsd: still no  
 reason for 'controlled legalization'?" well, klaus, i fear the people deciding 
 are not necessarily of the reichian type ~~~ anyway, here comes some ernst  
 jünger in own idiot-translation for all you "psychonauten" out there: "with  
 'mexican', the chemical, botanical or geographical kinship [of lsd, mescalin & 
 psilocybin. kfl] is only meant marginally. focussed is the special quality of  
 the intoxication/ecstasy  [the wonderful german word "rausch" is, like "himmel" 
 which is "sky" and "heaven" in one, just untranslatable. kfl], the quality of  
 removal from the countable and measurable world, and, thus, the quality of 
 approximation/reconciliation [here, again, the german word, "annährung", has 
 both meanings. kfl] ... when it becomes serious, we have to drop out, not only 
 out of cars, airplanes, rockets [!], state, society and family, yet also out of 
 our own armor. this is the border, where everything that can be named at all, 
 thus the 'namable', becomes --- spacing" (p. 290) ~~~ well, folks, this is all 
 for now ~~~ dive carefully! ~~~ i smell ya later ~~~ mc säure ~~~ ~~~ ~~~