the pros and cons of getting high accidentally.

lots of kids in high school were into all kinds of things that society frowns upon.  drugs, alcohol, ritualistic animal sacrifices, you know.  typical rebellious teenage stuff.

not me.  what was i into?  dancing, music, and being naive.

and oh what a blissful life it was.

i only accidentally "got into drugs" twice as a teenager.  i had two very very different experiences.

The Happy Feel Good Positive Side of Accidental Highs:

once upon a time when i was 16 or 17 or something like that my parents gave my younger sister and i the task of painting the walls of the lower story of their two story house.  i can't speak for Savannah, but I was excited.  i love to paint! earlier that summer i had painted my room light blue with sponge-painted white, fluffy clouds everywhere.  also i may have spray painted my name on the bottom of one of the walls with inconspicuous purple glitter paint.

anyway.  back to the story.

so we set off getting it done.  first we painted the living room; a few blue walls, a few yellow walls... no problem. piece of cake.  we had a great time.  then we tackled the hallways and the stairs.  we were several days into our painting project and it was at this point that our conversations took a turn for the weird.

as we were coating the walls of the entryway, we found ourselves discussing what kind of "inner tree" that we had. Savannah decided that she must have an Inner Banana Tree (obviously... Savannah Banana), but with an Inner Inner Coconute Tree (to account for the loopy and crazy aspects of her personality).  And the Inner Inner Coconut Tree had decided that the Inner Banana Tree was its nemesis.

we decided that in lou of an Inner Tree, i must have an Inner Bush.  an Inner Herbal Essences Bush.  why you ask? well, it's a bush because of my diminuitive stature, and it was an Herbal Essences Bush because we had gone to the store for... something... and during our outing i had smelled some Herbal Essences body wash with a tad too much enthusiasm, and some of it had leapt out of the bottle and onto my shirt.  my solution to the bottle's expression of jubilation was to try and rub the soap into the fabric of my shirt and hope nobody noticed.  they noticed.

by about Day 8 of our Painting Adventure, we still hadn't figured out that we needed to open the windows for fresh air, and the Paint Fume Situation was becoming dire.  we were on our last room, the computer/sewing room, and the work was crawling at a nearly immobile pace.  the proverbial "fly on the wall" would have witnessed two teenage girls, splattered in pink and purple paint, slowly running paint rollers up and down the walls, giggling quietly to themselves over nothing at all.... like mad women. 

the Painting Adventure ended with my sister, my bestie Jessica, Tash and i all piled in my car, paint on our legs, legs out our windows, rolling around town, singing waaaaaaaaaaay too loud to the popular boy band songs of the day, and attempting to walk through the drive through of the Jack-In-The-Box (TM) to no avail.  there may or may not have been sparatic shouts about Skippy Peanut Butter (TM) and toilet paper as we drove too.

moral of the story;  make sure to cra.... well, no.  it was actually kind of fun.  so if you're not too concerned about impairing a few brain cells, then keep the windows closed next time you paint.  IT'S JUST SO MUCH FUN!!!


The Frightening Near Death Experience Rendering Down-Side of Getting High Accidentally:

the day started off fairly uneventfully.  i got up in the morning and my legs hurt really really bad.  this was quasi normal for me, but i didn't have time to stretch and baby them so i went to the medicine cabinet.   my mom usually took Excedrin (TM) for her headaches, so i figured if they worked for a headache, then they'd sure work for my excrutiatingly painful legs.  so i took two.

insert forboding music here.

the night before i had made a strawberry cake for my bestie Ashley.   i brought it to school, gingerly set it in my locker, and proceeded to my first period class; Health.  irony.

during class, my legs were feeling better.   life was good.  all was right in the world.... and then... my stomach started feeling weird... and it felt like my pulse was elevated just a bit.  something was... off.

at the end of class, Adam caught me at the door and walked with me to second period (with a pit stop to get Ashley's cake).  i must have been looking pale because he asked what was wrong.

i didn't know... i just knew that i felt... funky.

i got to second period, english class, gave Ashley her cake, wished her happy birthday and sat down at my desk with my palms flat on the surface.  class started.  then about five minutes later Shit Got Weird.


i noticed that my right hand was... twitching, ever so slightly. this quickly escalated to a full on shake.  then my left hand joined in.

Inner Monologue (IM): Holy Crap... that's kind of weird.

then both legs began shaking uncontrollably and my face went numb. tears started flowing down my cheeks for no discernable reason.  i was really starting to freak out.

IM: OH-MY-GOD-WHAT-IS-WRONG-WITH-ME-WHY-IS-MY-BODY-SEIZING-LIKE-THIS-OH-GOD-I'M-GONNA-DIE!

it was at this point that my friends and teacher took notice.

friends and teacher: Krista what's wrong? what's going on?

me: (laughing and crying and shaking like a salt shaker) I DON'T KNOW I DON'T KNOW! HELP ME!!

Ashley and another girl got on either side of me to support me and started helping me down to the nurse's office.  and thaaaaaaaaaaaat's when my legs went numb.  they kind of just dragged me the rest of the way as i cried/laughed/convulsed.

at the nurse's office she started asking me what i'd been doing that morning and if i'd taken anything.  i told her through my tears about the two excedrin.  and then i promptly toppled over.  my back had gone numb.  oh joy.

the nurse laid me out on one of the beds so that i could flop about more comfortably.  i was now only subject to the seizing and the water works as i was terrified that i might die and it wasn't funny.  they called my dad to come pick me up.  apparently since i didn't ever have caffeine i had overdosed.  which makes sense considering that i had taken the equivalent of two whole coffee pots' worth of it .

anywho i got home, got over the shakes, got a HUGE BUZZ, cleaned the house, weeded, edged, weed-whacked and mowed the lawn.

i slept like a rock that night.


let's just say that i should never do Acid. or Meth.  especially since this was just from CAFFEINE.



Krista's Bedtime Thoughts:

1. i'm terrified of my first post-partum Period.  i imagine it hiding in the bushes, ready to spring, just waiting for me to be wearing light colored pants and for me to get more than twenty minutes away from my house... the horror.

2. my kitten is either the most laid back kitten in the world, or she's dumber than a booger on the sidewalk because every time she gets near Ronin he pulls out a fistful of her fur and she just keeps coming back for more.

3. you should never throw your cheeseballs in a fit of rage.  they are delicious and it's just a shame and a waste.

4. real crack is whack, but Emotional Crack? well i NEED my emotional crack.

5. i'm a first time mother. ergo i get a Free Pass To Be As Neurotic As I Want To Be.

6. normally urine and vomit = gross.  but Baby Urine/Vomit?  not so gross.  in fact, it's sometimes cute, even funny.

7. sometimes a massage is a need and not a want.

8. my wedding ring has a drool/rice cereal/spit-up coating on it.

9.  dude. i need a shower like whoa.

10. it bothers me when people confuse "breath" with "breathe" and "yeah" with "yay" and "yea".