Jeannette Cooperman in The Common Reader:
Psychedelics were demonized, research was shut down, and mushrooms went underground. Their appeal lingered. I came of age at the end of the next decade, and while other drugs scared me, psilocybin always seemed like something that, someday, I might try. The prospect of a mystical state softened the sense of scary transgression, the warnings about nightmarish trips. Nibbling a magic mushroom sounded far more appealing than swallowing blotter paper soaked in acid.
Though I fancied myself Alice, no one appeared with a silver tray of ’shrooms. Years passed. Then I read about research at my own university and sat bolt upright. Emailed the principal researchers. Begged for interviews and dropped heavy hints about volunteering for their next study.
Meanwhile, maybe I could figure out the magic.
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