Hung-upedness
There is also the experience, known clinically as “Hung-upedness,”
which strikes everyone regardless of race, creed, color, political
posture or place of national origin of the grass. Small tasks or
insignificant things take on tremendous importance and interest. Often
you find yourself doing some little thing over and over, like
scratching, or picking lint off of your dog, or staring at a tiny spot
on the wall. Sometimes when you run into the kitchen to find out what
happened to your friend (see above if you’ve forgotten about your
friend), you’ll find her closely examining the tiny splashes that the
dripping water makes in the sink. She probably has forgotten all about
the Tab that she wanted so badly - which is just as well. Dietetic soft
drinks are for the weak in spirit anyway.
Time distortion and hung-upedness act together quite often, and you
find yourself doing something inane for a long time and thoroughly
enjoying it, even though every now and then you think you’ve been doing
it forever.
When you do do something dumb, such as to watch “The Price Is
Right,” or “The Flying Nun” on T.V., another symptom is revealed. After
staring like idiots at the show for eighteen minutes, someone will ask,
“Why are we watching this stupid nonsense?” You will all turn and smile
and nod at the one who asked the question, then resume your watching,
as will he who spoke, until the show has concluded. Why? Because a
basic truth about being stoned is that everything is good. Nothing is
bad. Some things are phenomenally good, but nothing is phenomenally bad
(except getting arrested - but even that’s a learning experience.)
Funnyness
This is one of the most pleasant and exciting psychological changes
which occurs. There’s a little spot in your mind which tells you when
you think something is funny and grass expands that little spot until
that little spot takes over and everything is funny. Everything. Your
friend’s teeth are a riot. A simple “Hello”brings on storms of
laughter. And something which is genuinely funny, like hearing a good
joke or watching the Marx Brothers can turn you into a convulsive
maniac, writhing in agony and pleading for help. Going out in public in
this mood can be a risky act because of the laughing problem, as you
find yourself laughing at people who are not stoned and fail to see
what is so amusing. Sometimes they hit you.
Passivity and Inertia
Passivity is another of the signposts of the stoned condition.
Everyone is more passive when stoned than when straight. This does not
mean that everyone is passive when stoned in the pure sense of passive.
Hell’s Angels get stoned a lot and they’re not passive. They’re mean
and nasty. But imagine just how mean and nasty they’d be without grass.
They’d probably get rid of their little bikes and buy tanks and steam
rollers to run you over with.
The story which capsulizes this passivity isn’t very funny, but it’s
valid. If you haven’t heard it before we claim to have made it up.
Three men come to a walled city at midnight. A sign on the bolted door
on the wall to the city reads, “This Door Will Remain Locked Until 9
A.M. Tomorrow Morning.” Just by coincidence, the three men happen to be
an alcoholic, an acid head, and a user of grass. (Yeah, you guessed it.
It’s one of those rotten three part jokes.) After reading the sign, the
alcoholic says, “Let’s break down the door.” The acid head says, “Let’s
just float through the keyhole.” And the grass user says, “Let’s sit
down and wait for tomorrow morning.”
See, we told you it wasn’t funny, but it’s true. And true is more
important than funny. Of course, when you’ve got a funny truth, then
you’ve got something.
One of the reasons for this passive feeling is the law of inertia,
which results from the fact that whatever you’re doing at the moment is
too good to leave.
If you’re lying quietly in bed listening to music and enjoying your
ecstatic joy, someone invariably says, “Let’s go out.” They want to
take a walk, or eat, or whatever. This becomes the last thing in the
world you want to do. All you want is to lie there and listen to the
music. But finally you get up, put on your clothes, and start to go -
and now you’re filled with excitement about your adventure. Nobody, no
matter what, could ever get you back into that bed. Well, maybe not
nobody.
The rule is that your body, if in motion, will tend to stay in
motion unless acted upon by an outside force; and if it is at rest, it
will tend to stay at rest, unless acted on by an outside force. Say
that’s pretty good.
This whole thing could be very dangerous to your budget if you
happen to wander into a store while stoned. Because you will like
everything, you’ll want to start buying things. And once you start,
it’s hard to stop. So avoid stores of any kind, especially
supermarkets. They are the deadliest because they combine these
qualities with that of the importance of food. Enter a supermarket and
you will ram things into your shopping cart that you never noticed
before, like Pez candy or banana flavored Maypo. You can’t possibly
pass by the smoked oyster section - those pleading eyes and those
little tails wagging with joy at seeing you. And at the checkout stand
you’ll probably make an offer on the shopping cart because it’s fun to
get pushed around in. And you’re going to be very confused the next day
as to what to do with twelve pounds of mangoes.
Our friend Ernie once let this buying tendency get the better of
him. One day when we were in his posh Highland Avenue apartment, we
noticed a hundred and twenty assorted little glass pigs sitting on four
walnut bookshelves hanging on the wall. You know, the kind you buy
along with a pole lamp, just after you graduate college. We didn’t
think Ernie was the kind of guy who’d collect little glass pigs, so we
asked him about them. “I don’t collect them,” he said sounding slightly
angry. “I bought them all at once last week when I was stoned.” “What
do you do with them?” we asked in unison. “Nothing,” he answered.
“Don’t you ever look at them?” “Yeah,” he said, “sometimes. But only if
I’m stoned.”