Upon awaking to a fine Saturday morning recently, I knew that it was time for another exploration of the realms of non-ordinary consciousness. Since I had the good fortune to have come across a sample of 2CB a few days before I decided to make my journey with that material.
At 9:15 PM I ingested 25 mg 2CB on a completely empty stomach (having fasted all day). As I was feeling the first effects, my friends and I headed off to the bars.
Now, usually, I am not a huge fan of bars. I don't drink alcohol, for one thing. The bar scene just doesn't really appeal to me. And I would usually refrain from being in public while tripping. This time, however, I just felt the urge. I do not go out much, and I thought the bees might help me to connect to my friends and enjoy the experience of being out with them. Plus, my roomate was trying 2CB for the first time, and was determined to go out, and I wanted to keep an eye on him. So off to the bars I went...
The bar was typical. Lots of loud music, smoke, and drunks. I was feeling the bees surge through me and I had a huge grin on my face. I felt totally comfortable where I was. I didn't feel out of place or awkward, which I often do at bars since I do not drink. I was totally at ease. I felt inconspicuous. In fact, I was acting a lot more "normal" than many of the less psychedelic patrons.
As I stood in the bar taking in the sights, the bees kept getting stronger and stronger. I asked my roomate what he thought of 2CB so far and he responded that it was very nice. As in the past, I was fairly amazed at 2CB. One can be tripping fairly hard, and barely notice it. Then you look closer and WOW!
There were several televisions in the bar, and they kept catching my attention. I couldn't hear what was being broadcast, so the pictures themselves took on a sort of surrealist atmosphere. Sports clips and commercials, mostly. I found it difficult to ignore the TV, which annoyed me, since I do not like television.
There were several moments when I started to wonder if the experience was going to become overwhelming, given the setting. Luckily, it never did cross that threshold of comfort. It was quite intense, but I felt totally in control. The bees actually seemed to calm me to some degree and make me feel "up" and on top of things. Very keyed in.
I noticed that the women in the bar, while very attractive, were not very appealing to me. I couldn't understand the whole "bar scene". It seemed really alien to me. The fact they were all smoking and drinking had something to do with it, I suspect. I just couldn't get interested in drunk people. How can you meet anyone in those circumstances?
After a while we went to another bar nearby. The walk over was magical. It felt wonderful to just walk and breathe. Everything looked psychedelicized, and lights were haloing and smearing. Trails were very evident. Bees seem to make everything shimmer and look shiny and new
Inside the bar we ran into more friends. We stood around and talked to them for a while, then moved to another table. This bar was also filled with TV's and girls, so I had no shortage of things to look at. The 2CB visuals were enhancing everything. I didn't trust my perceptions of anyone's attractiveness, because by this point, everything looked great. There was a guy wearing what I can only describe as WWF wrestling boots. These were lace up cowboy boots, if you can imagine. As you might guess I (and my table mates) found this terribly amusing. The whole scene seemed slightly unreal.
The most impressive visual of the night (and indeed of my 2CB experiences thusfar) was the table we were sitting at. It was just a generic varnished wooden table, but WOW. It looked as if it were made up of a couple hundred filmy layers of something. Each was mostly transparent, and best of all, moving in relation to the others. It seemed to have a great deal of depth. I would have been satisfied to simply watch this display indefinitely, but I didn't want to look out of place by avidly staring at the table. It also seemed I could detect various types of energy flow between people. While watching people flirt and interact, it seemed I could nearly see their respective levels of interest/attraction/etc. This too was vastly involving, but again, I didn't want to stare at anyone too long.
Before too long, we moved to a dance bar, and I sat back and watched the strobes and blacklights illuminate some of the worst dancing I have ever seen. After a short time of this, we decided to head home. As an interesting aside, my roomate was feeling/seeing more at this time than he had been previously, while I was beginning to trail off.
At home we decided to do a few nitrous balloons. I think nitrous alone is relatively uninteresting, but on a psychedelic it is incredible. My first balloon sent me into a swirling world where everything was just bright colors and weird flanging noise. It was quite nice. My second balloon, otoh, was crazy. As I slowly ascended, my ego was reduced to a pinpoint, but didn't ever blink all the way out. I felt like I was texture mapped over reality. I was aware of and could see the room even with eyes closed. I felt like I was sailing through space, though I wasn't moving at all. It felt incredible.
After that experience, I was suddenly inspired to give salvia a try. I had been experimenting with salvia recently and it seemed like it might mix well. I got my bong all set up and quickly smoked two and a half (or so) crushed leaves. At the third or fourth inhalation, the room rushed away and I was suddenly in salvia space. Everything had the edged multidimensional look that it usually does under salvia. I felt the familiar "who/where/what am I" sensation, but was able to ignore it and focus on the experience unfolding before me. I was aware of what seemed to be hundreds, if not thousands of beings watching me. And it seemed that every one of these beings resided in a different reality or dimension. Furthermore, they seemed to be watching me to see which reality I would end up in. It seemed my thoughts/actions would determine where I would end up. After a few minutes I started to come out of this place and realized I was in my living room and I spoke, saying "Salvia is SO weird". I realized then there was a hit left, and I quickly smoked it and lay back down. At this point I entered into a much mellower but still intense salvia high. I was watching these beautiful columns of light/energy interact with each other, stacking and weaving and reforming constantly. It was quite lovely. This lasted for another ten minutes or so.
As I came out of it, we smoked some cannabis while I told everyone what I had experienced. Even though it was good weed, it seemed like my residual 2CB high kept me from achieving a really stoned state. It seemed to keep me at a certain level of clarity and to be almost fighting against the cannabis. I definitely felt it, but not as strongly as I would have otherwise.
This trip was very interesting and worthwhile for me. I was reminded why I don't care for bars, but at the same time, was able to enjoy being there. I felt really positive and completely at ease the whole night. The bees really seem to center me, and bring me into the present moment fully, without a lot of distortion. I might well have enjoyed tripping at home more, but I did get some interesting insights out of the experience.
The combination of salvia+2CB is great. It allowed to bring back far more from salvia space than had been possible for me previously. It seemed to short circuit (to some degree) the astonishment of being thrust so abruptly into another existence, therefore enabling me to pay more attention to it. I would recommend it to anyone who experiments with these allies.