Sometimes I Trip On How Happy We Could Be

by Nichole Perkins

Lol yes

  So annoying that you know

  lol why?!

  What else do you know that you don’t say?

  I may not know you to the bone but I know you better than you want me to

  Mmhmm

  I think he mistook my knowing him as well as I did as feelings, and it fucked with him. It was always very clear to me that we could never be more than booty buddies, even as I let myself do things with him I normally don’t do. I let him spend the night. I let him meet my friends. I spent the night at his place. I let him have food I’d cooked. (Again, to be clear: I did not cook for him, but sometimes, I’d cook knowing I’d probably offer him some. That is not the same thing. Sometimes I’d entice him over with the promise of a plate. He had me eating quinoa, which I hate, and mushrooms he had foraged, which scared me to pieces.) I let him watch Frasier with me. I even thought about going camping.

  I’m telling you: Give skinny men a chance. They will fuck you up.

  * * *

  Suffice to say, I felt comfortable and safe with The Hippie in a way I had not with anyone in a long time, so I asked him about his experience with shrooms. He wasn’t a sloppy or violent drunk, and when high, his philosophical California stoner joy doubled. He had good energy, and I wasn’t afraid of him or concerned he’d try to harm me if he got too far gone. I’d read about people advocating for psychedelics to help those with depressive disorders, so again, I said fuck it. I asked him if he’d be my trip buddy, and he said sure. We scheduled a dick-and-shrooms appointment, and then I realized what day it fell on—Valentine’s Day.

  I started to panic. Would he read too much into it? Would he think I was trying to spend A Significant Night with him? Would he bail? Did it mean anything at all subconsciously that I’d picked that particular day? More than worrying about a bad trip, I worried that he’d run for the hills. A few times, I’d let him read a poem I’d written, and one time, I showed him lyrics to a country music song I’d written while as high as satellite titties, and he’d always ask, “Is this about me?” Ugh. No! That fact that he thought everything I did was about him made me realize we were not on the same level of emotional intelligence, and I often found myself cursing the heavens because of his emotional ignorance. I was so tired of dealing with men who think anything beyond a moan of pleasure means a walk down the aisle.

  But, God, the sex was so good.

  Anyway, he came over, and I pulled the Band-Aid off to ask if he realized it was Valentine’s Day.

  “Yeah,” he said, next to me on the couch. “I was like ‘Oh yeah,’ but then I was like ‘Whatever.’ It’s fine. I don’t really celebrate it anyway.”

  Of course.

  My friend Lola had told me not to smoke weed for at least twenty-four hours before dosing, and I’d scoured the internet in incognito mode, looking for as many stories about what happens on shrooms as I could find. The Hippie gave me three capsules, and I tried to set a mood with a cool playlist of Kimbra, the xx, Bilal, FKA twigs, Björk, Portishead—music that’s difficult to classify but is good for sex and being high. The lights were low, and we were vibing, talking but keeping it breezy. I was trying not to focus too much on searching for the high, because I didn’t want to chase it away. The Hippie stood up and went to the kitchen to refill the water pitcher, and I started to cry, because I’d just been thinking how I wanted some water and I didn’t have to ask him to fill up the pitcher after he got me some more water. He simply did it. I couldn’t believe how thoughtful he was!

  How fucked-up was my dating life that a dude being courteous would send me into tears? He looked at me from the refrigerator with a crooked smile and shining eyes, and I said, “Oh, it’s happening.”

  And then I had an orgasm. Every time I felt a wave of euphoria from the shrooms, I came. I started freaking out. None of the research I had done mentioned sexual responses. In fact, The Hippie had told me he rarely felt sexual when on shrooms. He said he was too aware of his organs to feel sexy. So something must be wrong with me then, I immediately thought. All the southern Christian atmospheric shame of my childhood welled up, and I concluded that every orgasm meant I was some freaky freak of nature. And it wasn’t just the shrooms. Every time something good happens to me, I want to fuck to celebrate. No one else in the world is like that, right? Why is sex so ingrained into every aspect of my life? I must be an awful person. Am I going to hell? What is wrong with me? No one else in the whole wide internet talked about coming from shrooms. WHAT IS WRONG WITH ME?

  The Hippie held my hand and talked to me like we were having a regular conversation, and said nothing was wrong with me at all. He held me through each wave as I grabbed the couch and breathed and squirmed. He told me my reaction was kind of hot but never did more than hold me during that first crest of euphoria.

  I didn’t recognize my own voice when I talked. It got superhigh and nasally. I lost my accent. I called my friend Lola, which is unusual because we only ever text, and I told her I didn’t recognize myself, and asked could she talk to me so I could get my accent back. But then I felt another orgasm coming, so I made excuses and hung up the phone. From that moment on, she called me Kristy, because she said I sounded like a white girl and it was weird.

  Next, I called my friend Lee, back in Nashville. Our friendship was so important to me, and I could feel our connection. We went to high school together but didn’t become close until adulthood brought us back home in ways neither one of us expected. We bonded over the special misery you’re in but not allowed to complain about when your plans go to shit and you come back home and become the family’s errand runner, because you’re single and child-free and therefore people think you have nothing to do. We were also both creative women who tried to be “good girls” when we’re really magic.

  My friendship with Lee was a neon lavender rope humming with power. The colors were happening, but I needed her to help me get my Nashville back. The idea of losing my Nashville freaked me out because I’m still pretty conflicted about leaving home. I love being southern, I love how Nashville has shaped me, and I love my family, but I think Nashville will be my final resting place and that’s it. I feel guilty for not wanting to live there anymore, for breaking up my family and making my mother worry about me because we can’t get to each other easily in an emergency. So even though people often tell me I don’t sound like I’m from the South, I know Nashville still hangs on my tongue, and I never want it to go away.

  The tiny rebellions in my life—refusing to go to church, talking openly about sex, freelancing full-time, et cetera—may make it seem like I’m just floating in the wind, but they’re how I try to regain control of my life from other people’s expectations of me. My father ruined our family life because he could not control himself, and I can’t, I won’t, be like him.

  Losing my accent, becoming an unrecognizable person, made me think I was losing control, but Lee sent Nashville back down the line to me, and I told myself to let go.

  * * *

  That night, I told The Hippie:

  “It feels like we’re underwater, which makes sense because you’re Poseidon.2 He was a ho, just like Zeus.”

  “Limoncello. I don’t know this word, but that’s what I feel like. What is it?”

  “You smell like someone roasting a sweet potato over a campfire. A sweet, woodsy flame.”

  “I feel yellow. Can you fuck me while I’m still yellow? Never mind. I feel orange now.”

  When I told The Hippie I felt yellow, he took off his shirt, threw it across the room, settled himself between my legs, and started kissing me. When I said I felt orange and wanted to stop, he immediately stopped and pulled away from me but kept his hand on my thigh to ground me, and I thought, “Wow, do I love him?” He didn’t try to push anything and responded immediately to me while still making sure I knew he was there for me. The bar for men is in hell: My shimmying brain was thrilled that he listened to me.

  He stayed the night, and I smoked as I came down because I wanted my h
igh to last a little longer, even if it had shifted. He gave me another dose of three capsules, which I still have. I’d take shrooms again though, if I had someone I could trust with me, someone I felt truly comfortable with. I enjoyed the experience and…I didn’t die. I didn’t turn into my father. I didn’t turn into a fiend. I let go of me and came back to me.

  Everyone says you have to trip in nature, and I’d like to do that one day. Maybe go to a beach and listen to the waves. Let my boobs out and eat fruit naked while riding euphoric waves that leave colors through the air. That sounds lovely.

  * * *

  By early summer, The Hippie no longer wanted me. I was annoyed and, yes, hurt. He texted me when I was house-sitting for those friends upstate again, so I was by myself with three cats for company. I couldn’t gather my girls and go for a piss-and-moan session. He’d been around almost a year, and I’d become accustomed to him. I liked him. It wasn’t love, but maybe I’d fallen into a crush with my hookup, even though he never gave compliments. Or maybe I was just trying to hold on to regular company out of fear that no one will ever love me the way I want to be loved, that I’ll have to keep dealing with emotionally immature men until the nursing home.

  * * *

  Valentine’s Day feels different now. I’ve started to think of it as the anniversary of the night I let go, and not simply a day that underlines my loneliness. It’s a silly holiday, and so much of me wants to give up on it, but I can’t. Not completely. Like a fool, every time I write out my intentions for the new year, I list “Have someone to celebrate Valentine’s Day with,” and, like a fool, I forget I am someone.

  Footnotes

  1 In Ashes in the Wind, Alaina MacGaren must escape the devastation of her home as a result of the Civil War. She disguises herself as a boy and gets taken in by Yankee surgeon Cole Latimer. Her beauty is far too stunning to fool him for long, and soon they are drawn to each other and must deal with a different kind of battle. It’s fantastic!

  2 The Hippie had thick, wavy hair he almost always kept pulled back in a bun. It turned blond in the sun, but it had plenty of auburn and brown in it. I don’t know what color it was, but I guess you’d get away with calling it dirty blond. I loved his hair and always made him take it down for me or I’d pull his twisties off during sex. One night, we were at his place and we were both pretty drunk. He raised himself over me and tossed his hair back with his hand. In my inebriated state, he looked like Poseidon rising from the ocean, and ever since then, I’ve thought of him as the god of the sea…between my legs.

  The Bonnet

  In 1993, writer Pearl Cleage1 published “Hairpeace,”2 a funny, sharp collection of stories about her (and others’) relationship to her hair, because, as she points out in the piece, “You can’t be a black woman writer in America and not talk about hair. They won’t renew your license and, well, a black woman writing without a license in America? I guess you know the penalty for that.” I don’t think I’ve ever written anything formally, specifically dedicated to my hair, and I’m sure the Black Woman Writer Licensing Board is sick of my shit, so here it goes…

  * * *

  DJ was walking me back to my dorm toward the end of sophomore year. We were standing on the sidewalk leading to the building, but out of the way of anyone coming and going. One girl passed by us, and DJ followed her with his whole head. She was biracial and kept her long, loose curls pulled back in a sloppy, fuzzy my-mom-is-white bun. She was a fun, loud chick, who smoked like a chimney and had a husky, unmistakable voice. On this night, her hair was still pulled back but her ponytail was loose, perhaps freshly washed, because the curls were more pronounced. Other than that, she looked like she always looked—tanned, fresh-faced, and makeup-free. DJ watched her, focused on that ponytail, and told me, “You should grow your hair out like that.” I squinted my eyes and said, “We’ll see,” but the next time I washed my hair, I didn’t blow-dry it and straighten it out…or the time after that, or the time after that.

  That’s right. I started my Natural Hair Journey for a man. I am so ashamed.

  Wow. I don’t think I’ve ever admitted that out loud (in writing). The path to self-realization is a journey! Please don’t judge me.

  DJ wanted me to grow my hair so it would be long, and the best way for my hair to grow was for me to leave it alone, as in no more perms and no more heat. The thought of no longer perming my hair didn’t really bother me. Hairdressers over the years often gave me frustrated compliments—my hair was too soft to hold all the intricate trendy styles of the ’90s that required tons of hairspray and gel to make them structurally sound. When stylists washed out the perm, they’d tell me, “If I was you, I would just use a flat iron. You don’t even really need a perm.” They’d try to use as much oil sheen on my hair as they did their other, thicker-haired clients, and my hair would become a stringy, lifeless mess. I’d sit inside the salon for hours to get my hair straight, but by the time I got home, it was fuzzy and shapeless.

  My hair was also too fine for all the styles of the moment, beyond a basic wrap bob, which made me look like an Oompa-Loompa. The only style that looked good on me when I wore straight hair was a pixie cut, or as we called it back in the day, the Halle Berry. Shaved in the back, artfully tossed curls on top, the pixie cut lengthened my face and made my eyes stand out.

  My hair never grew to the length of the girl’s hair DJ had admired. I cut it and permed it again when I graduated from college so it could look nice under my cap. It would’ve looked nice under my graduation cap even if it was curly, but I didn’t trust that. I’m not sure DJ ever realized why I’d started wearing my hair natural in the first place, and I can’t remember if he ever commented on it without my prompting him. During my senior year, I was ignoring the writing on the wall telling me the end of our relationship was near. He was growing distant (because he was cheating), and I was resentful of only being known as his girlfriend when I had ambitions and so much more to me than being his woman. I had been afraid to be apart from him for any significant length of time, but I’d already started applying to grad schools away from New Orleans, where he was staying.

  So once again, I allowed myself a tiny rebellion, breaking free of expectations I’d placed on myself, and I changed my hair to prove I was my own person. DJ had no idea about my inner turmoil and would not have cared less.

  * * *

  For a long time after I started my Natural Hair Journey, I wore my hair in the only way I could style it: a wash-n-go. I leave my hair in a curly fro because I don’t have the talent or the patience to do anything more to my head. It took me years and years to figure out that even natural, my hair is still too fine for twist-outs, braid-outs, or any other full-body looks. So again, I decided, “I’m just gonna leave my hair alone and let it do what it likes best—nothing.” When I lived in DC, I overheard my ex Will describe me to someone as “big, pretty fro, lip gloss,” and I realized I had a Look. I didn’t want people recognizing me by my hair. Look at my face. I have distinct features. Tell them I have pretty eyes, a big nose, and a kissable bottom lip. Look at me.

  From that moment on, I decided I’d change my hair up as much as financially possible without causing too much damage to my hair. One day you’ll see me in braids, and the next month it’s a riotous crochet braid style. Here are some afro-puffs, and now we’ve got Senegalese twists, baby. I love my hair, but pay attention to me.

  * * *

  Mama’s Family (1983–90) was a sitcom based on a recurring sketch from The Carol Burnett Show. Vicki Lawrence starred as Mama/Thelma Harper, a tight-lipped southern widow who’d rather speak you out than hug you, but all her insults and abrasiveness hid a loving soul who would do whatever was needed to take care of her family. She wore her gray hair in tight curls, and when she went to bed at night, she’d wear rollers, with what looked like toilet tissue pinned around them, and a sheer pink bonnet to keep it all in place. Whenever she’d appear in her nightgown and bedtime hairdo, she’d have to pause a bit to let
the audience collect themselves. (“Filmed live before a studio audience!”) People would laugh like it was the funniest thing. The effort women make to be presentable is hilarious. Seeing a woman relaxed and comfortable is hilarious. Look at how unattractive we are when no one is watching, when there’s no man to join us in bed.

  Clair Huxtable, on The Cosby Show, with her husband and five children, went to bed and woke up with her hair looking courtroom-fresh. Whitley Gilbert, on A Different World, a woman very into appearances, went to bed with her hair in a looser ponytail than what she normally wore during the day, or sometimes a headband holding back her completely free hair. Later, when she married, her hair was always down and uncovered at night. Sometimes the women on Living Single might have their hair wrapped during late-night scenes, but if they did, their state was mostly used as a gag.

  On local news, if a reporter turned the camera to a Black woman in a bonnet, you knew she was about to say something ridiculous. Reporters chose these women to add local flavor, but it set them up to be mocked and dismissed. Every night at home, I saw my mother and sister cover their hair to protect it during sleep (and eventually, when I was old enough, I did this myself), and on every screen, it was a joke. Look at how funny-looking women are when they’re not trying.

  The vulnerability of being unpretty in the comfort of your home is unwelcome, laughable, and yet it also speaks to an intimacy only a special few are allowed to witness. When I lived with roommates or family, the bonnet was unremarkable, because it was something we all wore and grew up with. When boyfriends started spending the night with me, I’d wear my bonnet to bed, because that’s part of being vulnerable with someone, letting them see you at all levels of yourself. I can also admit it was kind of a test. If they complained about it or avoided physical intimacy because of it, that let me know I could never be fully myself with them. One boyfriend loved trying to fuck me so hard the bonnet would slide off. Another flat-out told me it made him think of maids and mammies. Wearing a bonnet is not the worst look I’ll ever have, but maybe it’s not the best, and if you want the privilege of being with me in the dark of night, you need to accept me, bonnet and all. Still, the fear of being laughed at, of being expected to be presentable at all time remains.