Carnival in Hell

I did not know! I did not even conceive the idea of what was about to happen to me. When I began munching upon the dried up mushrooms, it didn’t even occur to me that I was about to undertake the most psychologically altering experience of my life. It was a night that changed how I view the world. It was a night that changed how I view mankind. But, most importantly, it was a night that changed how I view my life.
This was not the first time I have munched upon psilocybin mushrooms. I have done it once before, but it was a low dose. It was like drinking coffee compared to this experience. The dose my first time was too low to be considered a true trip. It was more like being high, and feeling more in harmony with life. This trip went well beyond that.
I ate them in a group of 5 in Ocean City, Maryland. Now Ocean City is a crazy place to shroom. I ate them by the ocean on 4th street, which is in the middle of the boardwalk madness. I ate them with my cousin and a friend. The other two kids I didn’t really know. If I have one suggestion for your trip; it’s to do it with close friends. There’s an invisible wall that you cannot break when tipping with people you are not truly comfortable with. You have to do it with someone who will not care if you go crazy and throw up on yourself.
This is how the craziest journey of my life went. We started eating them around 10 o’clock pm by the ocean. There are always cops and people around on the beach at night, but we didn’t have anything to worry about as long as we ate the evidence. It took me awhile to get my portion down. Even though I have only munched once before, the taste was so familiar.
We all sat around excited and talked for a while. We took a walk down the beach. After awhile I started feeling a warm sensation in my stomach. I didn’t realize it at the time, but I started see patterns in the sand. It looked very peaceful and beautiful all at once.
We headed right up to the boardwalk. We sat down and watched the many people go by. OH SHIT! I felt the trip coming in hard. I remember one thing that kept going through my mind, “How am I going to be able to describe this experience to others?” Now that I reflect on it, it’s nearly impossible to feel, or even imagine my state of mind. Millions, and millions of thoughts were flying through my head as if my brain were on hyper drive. One thing I remember was when I sat down on the side of the boardwalk, and started losing my touch with reality. I was sitting in an obscure place, yet I did not care.
I have one thing to say, “Ripley’s!” Ripley’s Believe It or Not. If you have never been to a Ripley’s museum, you will have a hard time imagining what we went through. We snuck in the back door, of course. I am convinced that Mr. Ripley used many psychedelic drugs. The place was literally designed for us. If we were not careful, we could have lost ourselves in there for the rest of the night.
The highlight of the museum was the spinning chamber. It’s a tunnel room that you walk through on a steady platform. The walls around you are constantly spinning. I walked in there and tripped like I have never imagined. The black lights drew out colors that are indescribable in words. The way I felt was amazing. I could barely stand up. The room even tripped me out before when I came to it not on shrooms. That’s how crazy it was.
The entire Ripley’s museum was a crazy trip. The pictures, the walls, the colors, the sounds, everything seemed unreal. If I could describe one single moment of being in that museum it would require a million words. I don’t even think it is possible to ever describe the way I viewed the world at the time. I was lost in my own consciousness.
We left Ripley’s. I fell down the rabbit hole in Alison Wonder Land. My visuals turned into a mixture of Fight Club and the Matrix camera tricks. The colors were out of Moulin Rouge. It is impossible to describe. I could spend the rest of my life trying to make a movie to represent it.
We walked back onto the boardwalk. The sounds… The noises. The sounds the pictures, the images. I was stuck in Carnyville! I was stuck in circus land with scary clowns. The entire night, I kept hearing whispers as if I were in the movie Stigmata. I heard bells and little chimes. Colors whipped around me. There were rainbows in patches of darkness. People’s faces left images crossed the sky. I looked at my cousin Colby and the water in his eyes looked as if it streamed from his eyes into my soul.
As for the Haunted house, I had to pay for it. I had no concept of money. I took out my wallet and somehow paid. I looked at my drivers license and did not recognize the picture. Who the hell is that? Who am I? Oh GOD! What is happening to me!!!
The Haunted house ride was me being stuck in hell! I was scared shitless. I don’t know how I didn’t take a shit while riding it. It was just a regular haunted house ride. NO! It was being stuck with demons in hell. Everything, everything was so real. The colors, the sounds, the pictures, the mental images, my mind was running crazy. My mind was spinning. My mind was lost in thought, lost in emotion. What was my mind?
We walked around the boardwalk some more. We went on a few rides. I decided to ride the zipper ride with my cousin. I have handled that ride a million times. I got on it and wigged out. I felt as if my entire body exploded into a million pieces. I couldn’t determine if I was about to throw up, if I were throwing up, or if I had just thrown up. From that point on I felt the shrooms in my mouth once again. They were always there all night, all slimy from coming out of my stomach. I would put my finger in my mouth to feel them, and my mouth would be completely clean. I was merely imagining them. My cousin told me how to conquer my nausea, “Mind over matter, Mitch.”
I discovered that my mind and body were one. Everything I felt from my body was also in my mind. If I’m not sick, I’m NOT SICK. That’s how it goes.
We went into a mirror maze. I got lost in it. I got lost in a world that I cannot even explain. I stared at my dilated eyes. My face did not look like my own. It was sharper. It was more handsome. Yet, at the same time it looked more like the face of a demon. My eyes turned red and I ran out of the mirror maze.
The music and the sounds is what I wish I could portray. Just imagine cheesy carnival music. Now make it sound scary, with a mystic tune. Then make it become the background of your mind. La la la la. It was taunting me. Everyone was taunting me. I needed to get away! I needed to curl up in a ball. I needed to be in my own bed. I had nowhere to go. No one would listen to me. I was so ALONE!
My cousin was the only one I could relate to, but he was an advanced tripper. I had no one to comfort me. I wanted to hide. I wanted it to all end. I had no concept of reality, or even more, of what reality even is like. I closed my eyes and patterns danced through my head. I had absolute no concept of time. Drunken people flocked the boardwalk. Drunken people seemed scarier than ever. Their sloppy ways worked at my soul.
I kept picturing myself as an entity from a different world, an alien. I wanted to leave my body, yet I knew I couldn’t. I couldn’t let go of my functions. I was literally scared I might spew, shit or piss myself at any give time, and not be able to help myself.
I became stupider in the body, but smarted in the soul. I saw my life as one long journey. Where was I? What am I going to do with my life? I am only 17. I am going to be a senior. I am going to be off to college. What is the point of life?
I would be talking to my cousin and his friends for a while… They would suddenly say “Mitchell? Are you talking” My world turned upside down. Their voices blended together into some tribal language that was stuck in an echo room. My own voice echoed for an eternity after each word. Though, I didn’t have anyone to talk to. I was lost in my own consciousness. I was lost in my mind.
At one point of the night I ran down to the beach by myself. I may have whispered... no, it may have been a scream… “I am psycho!” I realized I was psycho, and I couldn’t do anything about it. I wanted to wake up. My friends hit a bowl. I get high a lot, but I couldn’t even imagine what being high was anymore. I wasn’t high; I was in a state of pure consciousness. I was in a pure state of thought.
The night wore fast, yet it was my entire life. My entire life was composed in the few hours I was tripping. Nothing existed outside of my life. I couldn’t return to the old world. I ran out to the ocean, and the visual I got from the dark surf was amazing. The picture of it sucked up my entire soul. It made me laugh and cry at the same time.
Well my cousin Tennille broke into my LaLa Land. She came running down the boardwalk and told us that we had to come in because it was 2:30 in the morning or something. Whatever, little cousins can over exaggerate situations sometimes.
We all went in. One thing I wished could have been different about Ocean City is less cops. They are cops everywhere, and they really made my trip a whole lot scarier. Another thing is wear your own shoes. I was wearing my cousin’s shoes. I kept looking down and I didn’t even have my own identity, because I wasn’t wearing my own shoes. You won’t know how important this is until you try it.
I tried to fall asleep. I tried. The whispers. The stigmata whispers were stuck in my head. I finally was able to fall asleep. All I could think about was, “Why can’t the world be in harmony?” I couldn’t understand why there isn’t more harmony in this world.

I was lost in time. I was lost in emotions. I was lost in my body. I was lost in my soul. I was completely lost in my mind… But I was no longer lost on my path through life. I now understood what it means to simply say, “I’m Alive.”

- Mitchell M.