Maybe I Shouldn't Have Driven High on LSD

Written By:  Andrew Eide

I’m not sure if you know what LSD is. It is a hallucinogenic drug promoted by Professor Timothy Leary in the 1960’s but actually it was a hallucinogenic drug created by our Government to use against our enemies and spies to make them “mind trip” and talk about the secrets they have been gathering.

The official name of LSD is actually Lysergic Acid Diethylamide but I’m not going to try to pronounce that over and over again so I will use LSD.

LSD is an interesting drug as it makes you hallucinate. I’ve seen things I will never be able to fully describe. Also LSD is not only a hallucinogenic drug but I call it a time warp drug also as I assure you that it warps your sense of reality and time.

Again I ask you to go into Mapquest or Google Maps and look up the intersection of Palomar Street and Broadway in the town of Chula Vista, California. Right at the corner where Palomar Street intersects with Broadway, and across from the two shopping centers listed on your map, there used to be an apartment complex named Broadway Terrace. I lived there for a few years before purchasing a home. The time warp incident happened in 1974 while I was living there.

Before I go on please look at your map. Broadway runs North and South and if you go North on Broadway you enter National City and then San Diego. You will notice as you go north from the corner of Palomar Street and Broadway that you will pass Oxford Street and then Naples Street.

One day my roommate’s brother, who served in the Navy Reserve, told us his ship was going to make a port visit in San Diego and that they would tie up at the Broadway Pier. If you scroll to see San Diego on your map just follow Broadway Street in San Diego to the West and as soon as you reach the water in San Diego Bay you are at Broadway Pier.

Before I go into the time warp details let me explain that in 1974 the common names of LSD were Strawberry Fields, Purple Haze, and Window Pane. Yes you have heard the Beatles sing about Strawberry Fields and Jimmi Hendrix singing Purple Haze, and yes both were singing about LSD. Window Pane got its name because the LSD liquid is usually painted on a thin plastic strip, usually something like a gelatin that dissolves in your mouth, so it looks like small little panes of glass. Strawberry Fields and Purple Haze got their names as they would put drops of LSD onto Sweet Tarts candy and let it soak in. The pink ones were called Strawberry Fields and the purple ones were called Purple Haze.

Back to the time warp story. My friends and I dropped some Window Pane LSD. Usually you start getting the effects of LSD in about 15 or 20 minutes. Normally the “peak” effects kick in at around the one hour point. The duration and intensity of the “trip” depends upon the strength of the LSD in the concoction you are taking.

We were playing a card game and our minds were wandering off many times. The phone rang and it was my roommate’s brother stating his Navy Reserve ship just pulled into Broadway Pier. He said they were only there for the evening and he cannot get off the ship but he had some Window Pane LSD for us to pick up. We knew he had great stuff as he was a Pharmacy Tech so he had ready access to all the materials needed to make LSD for us.

We hopped into my car and we are all tripping big time as it had been just over one hour since we dropped the LSD. I’m scared as hell to drive but I wanted more Window Pane LSD.

We pulled out of the apartment complex on the corner of Broadway and Palomar Streets and we start driving North on Broadway toward San Diego. In what seemed like a very long time I started to question where we were. Nobody else in the car could tell where we were and everyone agreed that since we have been driving for “such a long time” that we should almost be at Broadway Pier in San Diego which is a 6 to 8 mile drive from our apartment complex.

While cautiously driving I looked ahead and saw a side street coming up. I told everyone to look at the street sign and tell me what the name of the street is so we could tell how close we were to Broadway Pier. As we passed the side street we all saw that the name of the street of Oxford Street. OMG! We thought we have been driving for a long time and that we were almost at Broadway Pier in Downtown San Diego and here we are just one block away from our apartment complex!

We were so freaked out by this incident that we turned right on the next street, which was Naples Street, and we drove up to Third Street, and turned right. We then turned right on Palomar Street, and then right on Broadway and we returned to my apartment. That time warp incident was so traumatic for us that we called my roommate’s brother and told him we were unable to drive into San Diego to pick up the LSD from him. He said that was okay and that he would mail it to us in a birthday card and he did.

LSD is a fantastic thing and to this day I can tell you that I’ve seen things I can never adequately explain. I’ve taken what seemed like a very long LSD trip only to find out what seemed like many hours was less than one hour. I’ve also taken what seemed like a 5 to 10 minute LSD trip only to find out it is hours later and I lost that time forever.

Maybe had I thought to myself that evening “Maybe I shouldn’t attempt to drive into San Diego while tripping on LSD” that I wouldn’t have this incident still on my mind 41 years later.