2003-08-19 - 5:37 p.m.

Like I said, I don�t think I really �came down� at all. I was grumpy on Sunday, but I understand coming down to involve more getting insecure and depressed and paranoid, and just to put my nerdy Science spin on things once again, the reason it happens is that MDMA releases serotonin which makes you feel really good, but then immediately afterwards you don�t have enough to even release the normal amount to put you in a decent mood. Or something. Which is why you should give yourself a decent amount of time before you do it again.

I felt great on Monday morning. I slept solidly through Sunday night, and then Monday was once again an almost mockingly sunny day. After driving for about an hour (maybe less) I started to get a bit of a headache, almost as if my head was shrinking. And my glands were constricting. I had some water, but all of a sudden I really didn�t feel good, and as I mentioned a few entries ago when I start to think too much about it things subconsciously get worse.

So I pulled over to the side of the road, turned off the engine, and the next thing I knew I had passed out for about ten seconds, and seriously shake Jane up (I had no idea my eyes stay open when I pass out, or at least did this time- I can�t imagine how eerie and freaky that would have been for her. All my sister and Katy really knew was that after I pulled over Jane started telling me, with a hint of panic in her voice, that I had to say something to her now. I don�t know if they realised I passed out.

And then to add insult to� well, it was about 15 seconds short of something more than injury� I tried to start the car when I thought I was well enough to drive to the next town and the fucking battery had gone flat simply from having the CD player on with the engine off for 5 minutes. When it happened again yesterday after leaving my lights on for a minute (seriously, no more) while getting a newspaper I bought a new battery rather than calling the NRMA again.

Needless to say it wasn�t an option somewhere between Woodburn and Grafton, and at least waiting for the NRMA gave me time to make absolutely sure I was okay. Mind you our options were pretty limited when my sister can�t drive a manual, Jane doesn�t have a license and Katy is blind. So I made the very sensible decision to break up the trip and stay the night in Coffs, stopping a few times on the way and all the while feeling a bit nervous and kinda freaked out by the whole experience. I guess I felt irresponsible above anything- I had 3 other peoples� lives in my hands and in the end maybe I only had them by the fingertips. I can say what I like about personal exploration and all that but when it comes down to it, it was a mistake to leave myself no other option but to be the sole driver in a 10 hour car trip after staying up most of the weekend on ecstasy.

And it put a whole new slant on where Jane stands with my desire to experiment. Before she said she was okay with whatever I did but she didn�t want to do it anymore. Afterwards she really didn�t want me ever doing it again. And I can�t hold that against her after what she had to go through. True any number of things could have happened to her when she was doing it (getting a lift with someone still high and who had been hallucinating the night before and wanting to see if cars would stop for her on Cleveland Street are two things that spring to mind) but she didn�t think that way at the time and she does now, and I love her now and don�t want to hurt her. But it�s incredibly hard working out what I�m going to do about it. I kind of do want to try it again- if for no other reason than to reassure me that what happened this time won�t happen again (and I will of course make sure of that by removing the weapon from the equation- a car on a highway doing 100 km/h). But there are no guarantees of anything. I would just feel cheated if I had to stop trying things in what I consider a pretty sensible and controlled manner when Jane spent years throwing caution to the wind and not thinking about consequences and (even if she was just lucky) got through it and is the amazing person she is today. I have no desire to even look down the road she went down, but I don�t think I�m willing to put my experience down to a one off flirtation, when I weigh up the good, the bad and the ugly.

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