Recently, I became interested in altered states of consciousness. I practice meditation and raving (used as a method of getting into a trance and having a lot of fun to boot), but I have never tried a drug before. Well, I have been on Nitrous, but that was at the dentist's office... Basically, I only have experience altered states of consciousness for short amounts of time, and I want to see what it is like to have a lasting effect. The only way that I can really do that is with chemicals. Now, I've never smoked anything before, but since that seems to be one of the most common methods of imbiding chemicals, I decided to find out what it was like with a placebo sort of plant - spearmint.
First I gathered up some supplies - crushed spearmint leaves, paper, and strike-anywhere matches, and went outside under the pretense of taking out the garbage. Perhaps I should mention that I had no way of acquiring rolling paper, and the only paper in the house was binder paper and printer paper; I opted for the printer paper. Could this have been a mistake? I'm not sure... So, I tore off a piece of paper, about 3 inches by 2 inches (randomly sized), sprinkled a line of crushed spearmint leaves on it, and rolled it up. I gave the joint a twist at the end to hold it shut.
I struck a match on the ground, and held it to the twisted end of the joint until I was sure it was lit. I watched it for a minute, making sure it was really lit and the spearmint leaves were burning. Then, I took my first puff. It was a small, testing kind of puff. And I'll tell you something: the smoke may not have tasted bad, but holy shit! it stung my throat like a hornet in my esophagus! Wow. After coughing quitely for a minute (I didn't want my parents to hear), I decided to give it another go, and actually take a good pull this time. I put it apprehensively to my lips, waited a second, and then gave it a huge drag. Oh. My. God. That stung SO much. It was like a swarm of hornets in my neck, this time. I got it into my lungs, but I couldn't hold it in there. I started coughing a second afterward. I decided right there that I couldn't take any more of that, so I put it out, tore it up so it couldn't be recognized, and then threw it in the trash can outside. The matches followed.
Directly after throwing the matches away, I noticed a strange stinging sensation in the back of my head. I got a bit light headed, and now, a half hour later, I have a moderate headache. I still feel light headed, and kind of dizzy. I drank some sparkling cider and some tea, though, so my throat is not sore anymore.
I currently am not on any medications, and I'm not prone to headaches or light headedness or dizzyness, so I am pretty sure that this joint was the cause of these symptoms.
Overall, I would say that these two puffs of spearmint were pretty lame. I wasn't expecting any psychoactive effects; in fact, that is why I chose spearmint. I wanted to experience smoking in itself, before trying a mind-altering smoke. I think one problem could have been the fact that I used printer paper, so I'll try locating some rolling papers. I'll also try to find out what plants are a smoother smoke - spearmint is a bit too harsh.
Always experimenting,
Evan
