23rd August 2017.
I just finished a mug of black tea and can use a cigarette, but since no one in my family knows that I have associated myself with such vices, I will have to be content with the caffeine only, it’s okay though.
I cannot see the dark clouds over the yonder as it has darkened up already, but I can feel the wet breeze on my face, I can taste the rain around it, possibly it will rain again tonight, the day has been uncannily gloomy, sort of upsetting, heart-wrenching too if the sentiments aren’t kept in check; this is not a good day to read poetry or look at anything that can bring back stuff you wouldn’t want around.
Now if I remember correctly, I wrote a ‘prologue’ last night, and I don’t remember much from last night. A particular amount of time, like an hour or so is blank, I remember bits and pieces of it and right about now I’m trying to go back there and see if I can pull things back out.
I have always believed that it is a better choice to abstain oneself from unwise choices and habits. I once was a person who absolutely hated the concept of smoking, but we now know that I indulge into that voluntarily and at times I am the conceptual ‘bad influence’ on other people; I actually enabled two individuals with the habit of cigarettes, not something I’m really proud of. So as long as I was a good guy, I kept myself in a constant check, but shit happens, from cigarettes to Blenders Pride and Tuborg, I came a long way. However, I will still say that I haven’t been addicted to anything as of yet. Right now I can’t smoke or for the next one week or as long as it takes, it won’t bother me at the least. It was and always is about control.
Last night was one of those nights when, after a long period of serious misanthropy, melancholia, and sort of seething depression, one would really say ‘fuck this’. I say depression, although I don’t know if that’s the right word to use here, I don’t know what depression is, I’m just going out of my limb here and say that I checked my essential symptoms on Google and I either have depression or diabetes, I’m going with the former one here. So I said ‘fuck this’, and for the first time, I tried weed.
I have heard things about this particular narcotic, and it was possibly this information which somehow gave me the balls to try that, in basics, last night wasn’t about fun for me, I wanted to get high, wasted, for once I needed everyone to shut up.
Here I should make a note that narcotics and I, we don’t have a very good relationship, and I cannot handle stuff. I remember one incident from a time back then when I tried something at school and I ended up tripping balls. I seriously have no memory of that day apart from the fact that it was sports day and I was there, that’s it. So it was a bit obvious that something was bound to happen and it did.
Obviously, it wasn’t at my place; it was at Ashfaq’s den (not his real name – Ashfaq, Bismil, and Jatin are our pseudonyms), we chose this place, and it was an invitation to me and since I trust only these two, I agreed. Now I’ll just cut to the chase.
I knew the basics about how to do it – puff, puff go and relax. Tutored by the other two, I took two drags of the joint and passed it on, counting on that, I might have puffed 7 or 8 times.
At first, it feels nothing that’s like the first 3 minutes for an amateur or a beginner like me. After the 3rd minute (I kept a count or tried to, I don’t remember), everything slows down, like really slow, slow and descriptive. You can hear your blood rushing in and out you can hear things better, I remember I was smiling at something and I have no idea why. The other two kept a check on me.
Everything was normal (by the parameter of joint logic) until a certain point, and then it happened. I remember being melted away on the sofa, unable to move, I couldn’t feel the floor beneath my feet, everything went slower and slower until I just sat there looking at the ashtray. Someone was asking me something, maybe, I don’t know, I was busy collapsing inside myself, the implosion was overwhelming. I realized I had a cigarette in my hand but I don’t know what happened to that – I was there and nowhere.
For the first time in weeks, I was at peace, I was calmer than anyone, the other two who have the experience were active enough as if it was nothing, and I was in a place where none of these things mattered. Every resentment, every despair that I have known again in the last few weeks was gone.
Truthfully, the last few weeks have been a throwback to everything I thought I left behind. I have been sleeplessly chasing around thoughts that shouldn’t bother me, waiting for something or someone to happen which has just left me enraged and restless again, lucid daydreams had turned into dreadful incubus which reaches out and chokes me to death and I wonder have I been forgotten or abandoned because I cannot keep being an afterthought. It has been painful and I had to resort to old habits of punching walls again. Pain begets pain. The trip last night was blank, I was somewhere away from everyone and I was better off there.
Around an hour later I came back to my senses, or at least I got my motor functions back. Ashfaq asked me whether I felt cosmic because I certainly looked like I have left. Well apart from the moment when it was unbearably dizzy for me and I almost puked (as I said - relations). I remember my answer was somewhat like – I don’t know cosmic, I know dark.
That was just the first joint that rushed me to a place of solitude and calm, although it was dangerous, I liked it; I was a welcomed stranger in an outland and I came back without saying goodbye and I don’t have any intention of going back, not anytime soon. I just wanted to forget stuff, forget her (it’s always someone, all the time), I wanted to scream out the last bit but this works.
After that I had a beer and another joint before we went to sleep, it was the first sleep without a dream, it was a blank space on the ceiling which kept on going deeper into the night as the songs from the earphones were crystal clear to me, and I can actually hum out the song if I try.
As of now, I’m just heavy, my reflexes are a bit out of coordination, and I guess that’s a thing maybe.
I think I will be fine, I always do. I won’t need another trip
Now then, it will be better if I wander off, it’s raining here.
Goodbye moon men!
