contemplativeI have been reading this morning "Alternating Current" by Octavio Paz. I thought I might quote Paz on the use of mescal but now I am not sure. I have near me a slim book I recently bought at a used books sale titled, "Mescal And Mechanisms Of Hallucinations" by Heinrich Kluver quote from the backcover "Heinrich Kluver has pioneered so many trails that it will be no surprise to discover that [many years ago] he was emphasizing the importance of mescaline to psychology in an admirable book. . ."-Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences. I recently ordered a book titled, "The Wondrous Mushroom: Mycolatry in Mesoamerica" by Gordon R. Wasson. Paz quotes Wasson in "Alternating Current"-
"Radical physiological changes do not produce visions automatically, nor are all visions the same. To choose a convenient example, we need only compare the images that sacred Mexican mushrooms provoked in Wasson with those of the professors and students subjected to a similar experiment by Dr. Heim. The role played by the individual psyche is crucial. Baudelaire had noted earlier, as had De Quincey before him, that the dreams induced by opium in a poet and in a butcher were quite different. Now, the must disturbing effect of drugs is their power in the sphere of morality: a murderer may have angelic visions, the upright man infernal dreams. The visions depend on a certain psychic sensibility that varies from individual to individual, independently of merit or personal conduct. Drugs are nihilistic: they undermine all values and radically overturn all our ideas about good and evil, what is just and what is unjust, what is permitted and what is forbidden. . ." pg. 74 Octavio Paz
It is 11:13 AM what to do with myself the rest of the day. I like to just sit in our dining room doing nothing. There is nothing so I sit waiting it out in middle class luxury. I am a pig.
I suppose I should go get some money out of the bank and maybe visit a local thrift store to look at their used books. It is all harmless.
Well I will close to face it. No way out. (Many years ago when I was young I took a lot of mind alternating drugs like mescaline and LSD.)
