What we don’t say when we talk about the high

I still can’t settle on what came first, the high or the mental illness. I can, however, guarantee that the high does not go without that devastatingly beautiful gray cloud the morning after. This is the grace period, post-high, when you can hear the organs inside your body operate, and the clouds come so seamlessly it makes you hysterical. Not the sexually frustrated kind of hysteria, but the kind that makes you jump from happiness because you found a penny on the floor (this little guy will make you rich in a few years if you began to collect them now), and terribly sad because someone posted a titanic meme that reminded you that Jack is dead.

But the high does not exist.

They mostly tell you that the high will spike up your sex drive and mellow you down. That it will make you feel prettier, stronger, maybe, less cynical. They talk about the high like we talk about our futures as children: by 23, I will be married in a huge house with four cats, and two dogs. I said this once to my cousin Grace while brushing my Barbie. I would give half of my face (the good half) and both of my liver to recreate that warmth. This is how we feel when we talk about the high. Like when we talk about getting married on the swings during recess: you will wear a big white dress and he will cry when he sees you coming, there will be white doves and sparkles, fairy dust, hocus pocus, bunnies, and unicorns. But the high does not exist.

It’s an illusion. It’s not there until it’s gone and the void feels like you’re sleep walking. You know when you watch a wild wild west film that is set in the desert, and that music plays in the background (you know the one) and the wind is blowing and it’s empty, and that little thing that looks like a yellow broccoli flies from one end of the screen to the other, the way Hollywood movies like to hit you in the head with the obvious, so that wild flick doesn’t actually say “hi, this is set in the wild west, with cowboys who have weird guns, ugly boots, and strange mustache,” but you know all these things right away simply based on that stupid yellow broccoli. Even if the broccoli wasn’t yellow, and the fake sand wasn’t blowing, you’d still get that feeling, that moment, that silent cue. You’d know, this place is called a place that is deserted. Also known as the inside of your body, post-high. This feeling is potentially more addicting than the high. They don’t tell you this when they talk about drugs. They tell you it will damage your brain, and it will tarnish your teeth. They tell you it will ruin your life. Lies. All Lies. Forget your life. The high will take you away from your body, ergo, no life to ruin.

Have you ever felt your bones cracking? It’s physically impossible to feel your bones crack. Unless you wake up two days after stuffing your nose, in which case, yes, I can scientifically tell you, that feeling you can only explain through poorly thought-out-metaphors, that’s the feeling of your bones cracking. Next, your skin falls off. Seriously. It just glides right off like, “peace, gonna go find Jack.” And when you experience this, depression is just a nice way of saying “good luck.”

The high is for ten minutes. The low is for the next day and the rest of your life.

Your doctor will say, “let me recommend you to someone you can talk to,” but talking is what got you high in the first place. So then you sit and the person (a therapist who has never smelled pot) tells you, “here are some happy pills, they will make you feel better,” but Happy Pills got you feeling low in the first place. So your friends will say, “it’s all in your head,” but your head isn’t attached to your body and there’s certainly no brain in it, so you draw another line and go for a big one and poof, magic. And then two months later, it starts to rain after you’ve spent hours straightening your hair so you have a royal meltdown and the neighbour drives by and says, “hi, are you okay?” and you realize this might be the first person to mean it, “okay, are you?” and the answer is no. It is always no. The high is for ten minutes. The low is for the next day and the rest of your life. The high does not exist. But this feeling. This emptiness. This separation between soul and limb. It’s not just depression. It’s not just anxiety, this, that or the other. I’m not entirely sure what it is, but that’s why we don’t talk about it.