A few weeks ago he prepared 36” of San Pedro by putting strips of the green flesh + skin (discarding the core) in a blender and then cooking the resultant green froth down, down, down. He then froze half of the dark soup poured ½ into “fruit leather” trays of the dehydrator and dehydrated at 135 for about 5 hours. The leathery, sticky substance was then frozen and broken up. It did not, however, powder as does marinara or chili gravy when treated this way. He went to Sunday school and church. At church he spoke for a few minutes on the practice of mercy as a spiritual practice and of his deep gratitude for his church. He sat next to his spiritual teacher, grateful that in his life he’s had two teachers: first Stephen, later ____. He and his wife had a light lunch and he worked in the yard for a couple of hours. Then he ate what he hopes will be the equivalent of 18” of San Pedro. The cactus was mostly still sticky, though there were quite a few little papery sheets of green. These were combined into about 12 small boluses and each one was swallowed with water and some yogurt. He found this way to be much easier than other ways of ingestion. It is now 1.5 hours after taking in the San Pedro. He feels chilled, but can’t get to a long sleeve shirt because his wife is taking a nap. Earlier she had expressed reservations about this cactus trip, because years ago, he had taken large amounts of LSD on a frequent basis. That unbridled LSD use led to many things, not all of them pleasant or good. It’s an extraordinarily beautiful May day. All is green, clean, quiet on this little dead-end street. His wife is awake and he has a long sleeve shirt on – at last! There is a very slight queasiness, a heaviness to his body, a sense of a lack of direction or restlessness or something. Let’s have a look into the mirror. Not that much to see – same old same old. Sitting in the back garden, birds singing, the boys across the alley playing with all the energy and passion of 8 year old boys, somewhere a siren rising and falling, a band clattering on at the neighborhood fest a ½ mile away, looking down at his hands they are the hands of an old man, which is fine, as he has 64 years. Things are kind of shivery now, so green and fragrant, very beautiful. He went in to look at his wife – beautiful ___. He would have a smoke, but it seems like way too much to do. Better to lie down on the floor for awhile, a little chilled despite being covered with a light blanket. This room is a trip – all the books, photographs of the people and places he loves, images of Tara (Incarnation of Compassion), thangkhas, textiles from SE Asia, beautiful pieces of wood and rocks from backpacking trips in the West. Beyond that, though is this psychedelic vision today, now: what emerges in this trip is that the trip of the past 40 years is as true now as when it began – his marriage, his life, his work (and later, his beautiful son), all true, ALL TRUE.
