Grooving (1969)

[music] What turns you on? I have to learn lessons by experiencing things myself. [music] We're all sitting there digging the music and we're just having this great sensation. And if I do something well, I want to notice what I've done and what I've worked for. And I want to just have a natural heart. I can hurt people who like when I'm straight and feel love. [music] Somehow we ended up tripping together and it was just such a beautiful feeling of unity. It's really nice. I think I'd like to do that again. [music] [music] >> I don't smoke. I don't do pills or acid or anything like that, but I'd say a goodly percentage of my friends do. And so I get into contact with it. >> Why aren't you into drugs at all? Well, I've just never felt the need or the desire to. I don't particularly need it to make my life complete. I didn't think it would do anything particular for me. And I'm happier to take things naturally. I feel I can look to myself more than I'd rather look to myself than to look towards a drug for something that's lacking my personality. Well, I became acquainted with marijuana because my brother used to smoke it about 5 years ago or something like that. Before I think it was everyone else started to before it became really popular. I was about uh 13 then. I didn't smoke very often at all. Like about once every 3 months or so at a at an LY meeting that was a church meeting kind of thing. And uh then about 2 years ago uh I started smoking more often and uh then uh around April I think it was uh somebody turned me on to acid and I've been tripping about I tripped about I think I've tripped about eight times since then something like that. Masculine too. And um I had I tried tried heroin about a week ago and what else? I haven't one thing I've never had is any I've never had any down pills, you know, tunols or anything like that. And I I've had speed, but only a couple of times. And >> you like heroin? >> Well, it was very pleasant. It was very nice. A lot of people tend to think that they get sick from it. I didn't get sick from it. So, I thought it was I had a very nice, you know, experience with it. But that's about as far as goes. How? >> Yeah. >> Um, >> what did you shoot? >> Oh, I shot it. >> Did you skin or did you mainline? >> Made it. >> First time. >> Mhm. When you first started smoking just 5 years ago or something, you know, did you ever think, you know, that you'd be shooting heroin and tripping and things like that, or did you just think that you'd be starting out and well, I'll just smoke and then maybe try something else, but leave at that, not do much more. The way I thought when I when I first started getting into smoking was that I'd like to see what what all that was and be able to uh reject the things that were bad and take up the things that were good. And uh see I think that I'm the type of person who can't take other people's advice about anything. I have to experience I have to learn lessons by experience experiencing things myself. And like that's probably why I uh decided to to shoot Chuck because I wanted to I knew very well that there's nothing there's nothing to it. There's there's really it's absolutely a waste. But I had to do it myself to be able to say, "All right, it's really a waste." But I think that marijuana should be a part of some people's lives. marijuana. Uh, it's made me see the uh see what's important about living and what isn't important about living. >> What is >> what is important about living? Well, uh, being happy, being able to love and >> love when you >> love in what way? >> Love everything. not not hate anything. >> In other words, that all the time that every time that you smoke pot, you think about these things. I don't believe you learn them. >> The only thing I learn I don't think so. >> Why? >> Why? I don't think that that that Well, because I don't think you can learn it that way. I smoke pot for 2 years and I don't think you learn it that way. I've I've figured that that Well, I've I've learned that you don't learn it that way. When I was off pot and I look See, I know, man. smoking pot. All that happens is you get high, the people get high, you sit around and goof, you listen to to cut your jaw and the fish and groove. That's all you ever do. You never you never sit there and say, "Well, man, people is, you know, life is great. People are great. I I'm I'm learning how to love now." And I mean, come on, be realistic. >> The thing is, I think you would have been concerned about loving and living and um having a good life and learning about people, whether you had smoked or not. Perhaps when you smoke, you find it easier to wrap on and on and but it does it make the world beautiful when and then it wears off. That's all it does. >> Well, if I was in a place where there weren't any drugs at all, I would be just as happy as I am now. But since they're around and I enjoy I enjoy taking them, I I you know, I like them. I I would probably keep on using some of them. >> Could you stop? >> Could I stop? >> Yeah. Yes, I could very easily. >> Why don't you? >> Because you're available. >> Wait, if if you're taking the risk of getting busted, if you're taking the risk of ODing and dying, is that reason enough to stop? >> And if not, what is? >> That's a really difficult question. I I don't like to think about all the risks I'm taking very often. >> I bet you don't. >> And uh >> I wouldn't either. The time when I would stop is if I thought that it was uh getting me into a situation where I needed to uh get high to uh have a good time or to be happy. >> The drug was starting to control me. In other words, well, the thing is that people start out and it's a small segment of their life. something new or something interesting and they enjoy it and they go on and they do drugs more and more and it becomes to the point where you don't just say well let's go off and do something. It's always let's go off and smoke, let's go off and drop some acid, you know, let's go do some ups or downs until the point is you sort of it becomes like first position in your social sphere. That's the point at which I think I would stop if I became that dependent on it and it became that much that important to me to do some to do drugs. >> I don't think you would stop. >> You don't think I would? >> This isn't even a case of dependence. >> Hasn't that point come? >> No, I don't think you would. No, >> it's not part of your life. >> Part of my life. It's it's a it's like it's like an addition to my life. It's not really a part of it. >> Well, no, I guess it >> I couldn't Yeah, that's right. I couldn't say that it's not a part of my life. >> So, you've reached that point already. >> It's just it's become so much a part of you that you don't even notice it like getting up and brushing your teeth or something. Well, I just realized it and I haven't I haven't thought about it that way before, but you've made me aware that it's sort of like it's sort of creeping up on me like that that way >> and uh becoming more and more important, taking on more and more importance. >> Yeah. So, >> what about that? >> Well, I think that is something too that's, you know, definitely should be looked into. I should do something about that. >> Yeah. because, you know, that's that's the only thing that uh I'm wary about drugs. That's the only thing that I think uh that's the only reason that I would uh stop when it starts to take over. [music] >> [music] >> I'm entirely straight. Entirely. I've never smoked. I have a lot of friends that smoke. I have a lot of friends that grass, hash, some speed, some THC, some escalator. >> You have been absolutely straight. How does that make you you all feel? >> That's really nice. You know, it's like he's saying, "Well, I don't really need this this crap." You know, >> I don't know. Like the attitude of somebody who says, you know, I'm I'm I can't explain it. It's a really strange thing, but like somehow it seems more natural to me to have at least experimented with drugs than to never have. It seems like you're afraid of the experience and you won't do it. I think you say it not because of any real reason like that your parents have instilled strong moral values in you or because you figure it's just not a sensible thing to do, but that you're really frightened of it. I made a decision because of a couple of bad things I saw. Like really bad things and things that were very disturbing to me. >> What? >> Well, two things. Number one, I saw a guy who had been smoking every day for like 5 years. And and this is in addition to to tripping and speed and masculine. And this guy who was a a really good music student, he was going to music and art. He was very good and is now kind of a marshmallow. He walks around in a permanent piece and it he gets coherent once in a while. But it's it's a disturbing thing to see someone you know go straight to hell. And I made the decision [clears throat] that I a strong enough person to probably do without it all my life. But I forced myself, you know, to just do without it. In other words, I' i'd work myself out of of whatever I was in and I just made a decision that I didn't want to smoke. >> I respect somebody who realizes that there's a danger involved, that they might really get messed up and doesn't want to, and says, "Okay, I'm not going to do it. I'm going to hold off as long as I can. Maybe eventually I'll end up smoking and trying it, but I'm going to put it off as long as I can." I think in my opinion, I know I won't go on drugs now because I've been through enough things that I know that however bad anything is may seem at the time, it's going to pass. And I never felt that that I wasn't going to survive. So, I had to escape from the situation. >> A lot of people who get into drugs do it because like this is a really interesting point. I was reading in um the art of loving by Eric Farley and he said that people people are feel alone in life and they feel separate and you can overcome this by you know persontoperson contact but a lot of people aren't able to do this and so they try and overcome the separateness by going into drugs and so somebody who's confused and lonely doesn't have a sense of identity can get into drugs for a sense of importance >> [music] [music] [music] >> You know, the thing that's wrong with the grown-ups nowadays, come to think about them, is that they They when somebody takes pot, snort, whatever they want to take, the grown up saying they're just trying to find a way out. You know, you feel free. You feel, you know, like your mind is free. There's nothing tight in your mind that you're thinking about. You feel real happy. You know, that's the way I feel about like people say, "Are you doing this for an escape?" It's like, "Why do you like chocolate candy?" You dig it, right? Well, I like getting high. That's all. I'm not trying to find an escape. I just enjoy it. You know, you just want to feel free. That's that's a way of feeling free. I think everybody would have to admit because when you're drunk, you have no problem. >> How about when you're not drunk? >> When you're sober, you have lots of problems. >> Why people start is to escape reality. And I find myself I can face my own problems pretty well without having to resort to anything else to, you know, help me. Um, >> I can dig drugs with people who don't dig it. Not naturally, but they something I think something's wrong with them. I'm sort of like an egotist myself, but I'd like to say to myself, there's nothing wrong with >> But you don't dig people who don't get hurt. >> I know. I don't I didn't say that, but let's say I put him down a step who say I don't want to turn on. >> Why? I mean, why do you do I'm interested in why we ask him? >> I don't know. I really can't tell you. >> I think you do. I mean, I think I think it's very simple. >> I don't think it's too a big trip. >> Could I ask him a question? You like Chinese food? >> Yeah. >> I don't like it. Would you put me a step down because I didn't like it? >> Go ahead. >> No. >> That's why I I can't analyze why I do not know. All right. I don't know. >> You've got to be hiding something because if if you like Chinese food and I don't like it, I got to be lower than your man. >> All right. All right. I think it may be a feeling that I'm cool and hip cuz I take drugs and that these people aren't. >> How about that? So, a person who doesn't take drugs, the only reason he's not hip is because he doesn't take drugs. >> No, wait. You're putting words in my mouth. I'm saying >> I put him on a a lower like they have to prove to me >> that like >> they're equal to you. >> Yeah. >> People stop asking questions. question you ask yourself if you're a bombardo >> who are you to be proved to >> I think in nine out of 10 cases that any younger kid let's say below 16 who says to himself I can do it infrequently and control myself and still run my life the way I want to is just kidding himself cuz it turns out the way he wants to is to get stoned once your your aim shift >> like they say um you know I can control it and then once they're getting stoned on grass a lot they figure why bother to control it I'd like to try something else like it's I think it's pretty well people don't think anymore that if you start on grass you're going to automatically end up shooting smack you know that's kind of discounted now like that isn't true that it happens in every case but it is true that after a while and you've gotten so that it's a boring high on grass you're really curious and you and you want to try something else yeah >> anybody who starts to smoke after a while really gets into it >> and then at a certain point when you start to smoke then it really starts affecting you. >> I didn't do it that way. >> When you start uh you know using it uh when you're feeling bad to make yourself feel good and then when you're having a good time to enjoy yourself more when it gets to that point then it really starts affecting you. >> And when it got to that point that's when my motivation started to >> fall away and my interest in things started >> as it was falling. Did you know it was falling? Did you realize it was happening or is it, you know, later on? >> No. No. What I said to myself during that time was, "Wow, I'm really finding out where it sat >> at the time when I was smoking the heaviest >> is when my marks were the worst." With me, it was the sort of thing where uh I'd forget if I made a phone call or mailed a letter or, you know, small things like that, but all the small things I was sort of not sure if I did, you know, did I remember to hand that into the the report into the teacher? Is it still in my locker? >> You know, and then I'd have to go and check >> it was something about a week ago. I could usually remember it pretty well, but if it was something that day, I had I guess I had a lot of trouble with it. >> I mean, I forget to do things like, you know, I'd leave on the oven, you know, I leave on a record player, you know, like I go into school and the guy, you know, the teacher would ask me or something and I say, "Oh, wow." >> I don't know. One of the feelings like when you're getting stoned a lot, if you don't whether you're stoned or not, you don't care about that much else. Like you just like, you know, think, "Wow, beautiful. Life is just lying back and grooving around." The closest time I've come to The Sensation of Being Ston, I think, was a time that um there was a show that we put on and I played in a band in it when we made a tape of it and we're playing the tape and and we all got really happy because we're all lying there and no one's talking, but we're just we're just having this great sensation and uh we all walked out of the room with this this piece of music in our mind. And to me, you know, this scene, I don't know if it's if it's ever like this, the closest I've come to being stoned. >> Only it's so much better than being stoned because, you know, that it's real. >> Yeah. And and you know, there's no down after it. There's there's a slight down, but you know, I can go out and play again and I I can get up and I'm using that. >> And the thing is like if you get really happy and high on grass, it's nothing lasting, you know, like but you you learned you gained and learned something from that real feeling of happiness and success. And it's a good it was a good thing that was built into your personality and it's going to last. Whereas when you get stoned it's nothing, you know, it just goes right out of you again. Being stoned is just froth, you know. It's like just something something Yeah. It's froth. It's nothing meaningful, you know, and like it's like, you know, something that's maybe a little like sugar, something sweet and light that just disappears. It isn't like something that's really wholesome and fulfilling. [music] >> [music] >> When I first started smoking, I had a little oath with a few friends that we never do anything else. And then it ended up that a couple of us tried crystal meth. And a little later on, uh, a couple of my friends had tried acid. So I decided that for me the oath was nothing anymore. But I lasted about a year before I tried acid. And uh, I wasn't afraid of it or anything by the time the year was up. It's just curious. I liked it an awful lot. Liked it too much cuz I did it too much. And I ended up about a week later I tried heroin just out of curiosity and odeed on it and almost died. I I I smoked and at first it was uh pretty fearsome because I I smoked uh I smoked pretty much right off and uh after a while it just became sort of commonplace thing to do. And I made up my mind right in the onset that I I wouldn't let it have the best of me at all. That it would just be sort of an added exotic essence in my in my life. But um as it turned out, I I stopped having having fun doing a lot of things that I used to do. And I stopped uh enjoying like walking uh downtown, you know, or playing or uh or driving or anything, you know, unless I was stoned. just turned out pretty miserable and it did get the best of me too cuz I I was stoned all the time and I was buying it all the time and then I got busted and then that was like uh that was like the icing on the cake even even uh when you haven't smoked anything you just sort of have a a very slow you know easygoing type of attitude >> just sort of flow along >> right and you don't uh you don't pick up things as quick you don't do anything as quick or as efficient And it just uh it slowed the whole thing down. >> I've gotten really really stoned at night and then I had to drive from from Boston back to Richfield and like my reflexes are just, you know, like rubber. My arms, you know, I watch my hand doing the shifting and it's just, you know, like a piece of rubber. It's ridiculous physically with me. I can't I can't move as fast. The grass is depressing. So you like [music] you hit the brakes and you don't think, well, I'm going to hit the brakes. She hit the brakes out of pure response. That to me is the frightening part. The the thoughts that I have when I'm driving a car aren't about the road usually. They're about um they're about uh just totally disconnected things. >> Well, that can get a little dangerous. [music] >> After a while, you can get only so high and then it's really a boring experience, you know, like you sort of you it's like not you don't freak out. your stone out, you know, it's nothing. I've had the experience and it's over. So, I don't feel like I have to get really involved in doing it again. I wanted to like this spring I sort of I was I don't know, I was in sort of a self-destructive mood and I just wanted to see how far I could self-destruct myself and I did and then after a while I realized that it was ridiculous and I stopped. >> How did you self-destruct yourself? What destruct? >> Well, I don't know. Like I was pretty unhappy, you know, and so um I didn't smoke to make myself happy. I just smoked because I was sort of fed up with things and I was like trying to undermine myself which is what I did you know my grades went down I felt like I was losing contact with all my friends I couldn't write as well and everything like that and then after a while like the thing that got to me the most like I don't really care about the grades but it bothered me very much that I couldn't write anymore and it bothered me very much that I felt paranoid about friendships and so I just stopped smoking because I hated that feeling so much. I felt like that time I got really stoned. I went in the room with um friend of mine. We sat down and every I just felt like everybody was staring at us and you know thinking look at those two they really you know freaked out and stuff like that. I just felt so paranoid like they all hated us and they kept staring at us and I just you know I just couldn't stand it. That's that's what I'm talking about because like it didn't happen to me when I was stoned. When I was stung with people, we were all brothers and it was really nice. But when I was straight, I'd feel as if little things that I said were misinterpreted. And usually it doesn't bother me like if somebody spills a Coke on the rug and I have to clean it up. But like I find myself, you know, somebody would do something like that and I get so irritated. I just want to throw everybody out. And so I stop smoking. >> Well, I I don't like to do grass or hash anymore. Um, let's see. Because I guess it's like I'm a lot happier without it and it's I don't find it that, you know, particularly fantastic doing it. And I really like the tripping of the meas. I really I don't know. I think I'd like to do that again. When we did when we did the masculine like um I sort of freaked out, not completely, but like it was bad. And we went up together the everything was split like there were clumps of people and I felt really frightened because I felt very much alone. So, I went in the back room and all of a sudden, like I didn't know what happened. I was shaking all over and I was crying and I was on the floor and I was asking for my two cats that had died and I was saying everybody hated me and it was frightening and everybody, you know, is saying, "No, we love you. Don't worry. It's okay." You know, I calmed down. But I really like the experience. I want to do it again. I don't know what it is doing something. I'm not quite sure what it is. It's scaring me, I think, cuz um it it you know, you're sitting here telling me that that that you really dug it. and do it again. You know, my reaction is, what kind of a nut are you? You know, that's my reaction to what kind of an idiot are you? >> You know, how could it it be good? How could it be pleasant? How could you want to do it again if all that stuff was happening to you? >> Like, you can't really understand it for like these are the I told you the bad things and counteracting that was like the feeling like there was this one person. I didn't know him at all. And then like that night somehow or other we ended up tripping together and and so like you know we were just like I had I had to be supported or I fell over. So we were just completely in each other's arms you know and it was just such a beautiful feeling of unity and then like after I after I went home you know and like all where our arms had been touching I could feel myself bleeding and he could he said he felt all this wind blowing through his body where we've been touching. I just think that you're sick that that it's just really ridiculous to be able to sit here and say that this is a fun experience that I would like to do, you know, again if you know sometime next year or something, you know, but and then say that that that that there's unity and beauty in it and everybody's hugging each other and feeling blood on their own. That's that's totally disgusting. >> I found disgusting >> because I I can hug people with while I'm straight and feel love and and you can hug people while you're while you're stone and feel blood and that's that that's sick. Okay. Why is he sick? >> Why do you need a chemical to do that? Yeah. And see, and I know that you're going to say, "Well, I do that without a chemical, too." And then, well, then then I would say, "Well, why does he got to have a chemical for >> the things that are wrong with my personality? I would never dream of passing with drugs." Like, if I if I'm screwed up about something, I'm going to work it out for myself. Not with anybody's health, not with a drug's health. >> I just really don't believe you when when you say that you take care of your problems and and deal with things and that's not why you get high. get eye for other reasons. The reason for me not believing it was just mainly because I've seen so many people say the same thing and it turned out not to be true. >> Yes. You can't you can't take the judgment from one situation and apply to another. >> I'm just see what I'm doing is taking it from experience, man. Cuz I used to get high at people and I used to trip people and the same things happened and I was and I sat in the same chair, you know, tears ago saying the exact same things. >> Right. That's you know and this is me and slow down and I know just through experiences that that that's it's all nonsense. [music] [music] [music] What I think what what what these three days has done for me is I don't know if if it's made me any stronger in terms of my beliefs. I don't know what really if it's done that cuz my beliefs are pretty strong right now, you know, that I'm against drugs. I don't think people should take drugs and things like that. >> You know, I genuinely did genuinely feel before that I wanted to do the methylin again. Now I'm not so sure. like I don't I don't I disagree with them entirely that I'm sick and I don't I can't find a sense of unity on my own and everything like that because I don't think it's true. You know, I know myself well enough and I respect myself and I couldn't do that if I thought that was true. But um you know I think about it and I don't have a real reason except that it was fun and you know like yeah it's fun to drive a car really fast too but if it endangers somebody's life I'm not going to do it. I'm curious about the the drug experience, but I'm not curious enough to try it myself. I definitely don't want to try. I don't think it's worth it. Uh the way I feel about Joanne and Lee is that they never really got into drugs. So, you know, they don't the things that are messed up about them, they can take care of by themselves and pretty easily where I have a lot more things to take care of and it's going to be a lot harder. Well, I feel like from talking to people, I have no desire to do masculine again. And I like I know now that I'm totally out of grass and hash and like actually I'm finished with drugs. Like I satisfy my curiosity and I'm happy without it and I find I really don't need it. I'd rather turn to myself rather than a drug for any personal satisfaction I get out of life. And I feel that um well these people who tried drugs and then they decided it was a waste. Well, the whole experience seems to me to be such a waste of time. I've never see I've never had people I've never had anyone talk to me about against drugs before and and just and really really argue with me about it. The only person that's ever told me anything about not taking drugs is my mother. And just because she's my mother, I never heard I never listened to her. I never even heard her. But person people my own age telling me this makes it all makes it completely different. and Peter and and Gabe. I just can't ignore what they [music] [music] [music] grew. What turns you on? What makes you groove? What turns you on?