Riding a Bicycle on Psychedelic Mushrooms

            Riding a bicycle after consuming a handful of psychedelic mushrooms is much the same as riding a bicycle anytime, except for the fact that you’re tripping balls. Tripping balls while riding a bicycle is much the same as tripping balls anytime, except for the fact that you’re riding a bicycle. Are there any other questions?

            -Are you going to tell us a story about riding a bicycle after consuming a handful of psychedelic mushrooms?

            Great question! Yes. Yes, I’m going to tell you a story about riding a bicycle after consuming a handful of psychedelic mushrooms…

            -Well?

            Well what?

            -Well, are you going to tell us a story about riding a bicycle after consuming a handful of psychedelic mushrooms right now?

            Oh, you want me to tell it right now? The story about riding a bicycle on psychedelic mushrooms?

            -Yes. Yes, I want you tell me story about riding a bicycle on psychedelic mushrooms right now!

Well, okay, calm down, I’ll tell you a story about riding a bicycle on psychedelic mushrooms right now.

This is a story about riding a bicycle on psychedelic mushrooms.

            I was riding a bicycle after consuming a handful of psychedelic mushrooms when my rear tire suddenly went flat. I pulled to the side of the bike path to inspect the damage and immediately realized that I had no flat tire at all. It was a phantom flat and I immediately wondered how long it had been following me. “How long have you been following me?” I asked the tire.

The tire did not answer, so I got back on the bike in hopes of outrunning the phantom flat. But damn if that phantom flat wasn’t following close behind, constantly urging me to stop and check my rear tire. So, again I stopped and again there was no flat. The tire was fine, but I knew the phantom flat, that wily son-of-a-gun, that tricky bitch, was still there, mocking me. I was about to get back on my bike when suddenly, all of a sudden, abruptly, out of the blue…

BOOM!

...a heavy, deafening explosion shook the world around me.

I turned around and looked up just in time to see a bird—was it a bald eagle? A peregrine falcon? A very fit ostrich? Who knew?—fall from an electric line that hung precisely thirty-seven feet, three inches off the ground. Time suddenly slowed down as I watched this bird fall head over tail, its wings flopping, its feathers on fire. It smacked the ground at an incredible speed—not terminal velocity, but undoubtedly some fraction of it—and lay motionless in the high, dry grass.

Out of nowhere, a crowd evolved, a dozen strong. Where the hell did all these people come from? They all pointed at the bird and asked questions only the bird could possibly answer—Is it all right? Do you think its hurt?—but the bird, like a stubborn old man staring at those punk kids in the park who have no respect for anything these days, said nothing. And then, a miracle. The bird rose from the ground—from the ashes?—shook itself violently and stumbled away from the electrical tower like a seasoned drunk stumbling out of a bar at three in the afternoon. Which raised some questions: How could someone possibly get so drunk so early? And why do people claim that vodka is tasteless and odorless when any idiot with a tongue and a nose can tell you otherwise? I guess some questions may never be answered.

The crowd cheered!!! The bird was alive!!! But the cheers were short lived. Another problem arose—from the ashes?—a far more serious problem. The high, dry grass was now on fire!!! And the bird, it seemed, had started it. Fucking arsonist birds and their disrespect for fire! I was half-expecting Smokey Bear to run out of the woods and lecture his fellow animal on preventing wildfires, but nothing, no bear, just a group of spectators on the verge of hysteria. What will we ever do?!?

Luckily, I was there. With no formal training (or informal training for that matter) on extinguishing wild fires, I immediately decided that it was up to me to put out the fire, to save the high, dry grass from burning alive. I went into action, dropped my bicycle, jumped a four-foot high chain link fence and approached the raging fire with reckless abandonment. The crowd all stared at me, at the hero in front of them, unquestionably thinking: What I wouldn’t give to have just an ounce of that man’s courage.

I was only a few feet from the flames when the sound of sirens filled the afternoon sky, which triggered an unsettling fear of authority figures that had been lying dormant in my psyche since childhood. What the hell am I doing? I thought out loud.

“What the hell are you doing?” Some guy yelled at me from the crowd.

That was the same thing I wanted to know. So, I did a quick review of the events that had just previously occurred: A loud noise, a flaming bird falling from the sky, a grass fire out of control, me hopping a fence that clearly said “NO TRESSPASSING.”

I stared at the fire and then at the crowd and then at the fire and then at the bird, who was still stumbling away from the flames. It was then I remembered that I had previously eaten a handful of psychedelic mushrooms and had no business fighting a grass fire.

I hopped back over the fence, grabbed my bike and took off for home, that damn phantom flat riding my ass the entire way. Looking back, I often wonder if the phantom flat and the flaming bird weren’t working together the whole time…