Housecleaning on Acid
Once a year or so I like to drop acid and clean the house for ten hours. This practice has a number of unusual benefits.
The set and setting are clear and precise. The set, or intention, is to clean and in the process view the material representation of myself unmediated by daily habit. The setting, or safe-space, is of course, the material representation of myself, the safest place I could be, my own apartment.
This self becomes strange. Unlike other drugs—analgesics (pain-killers), stimulants (amphetamines, cocaine, Adderall) or just plain table wine, all of which, depending on who you ask, can tend to reinforce and strengthen mental fortifications (repetitions)—acid has the profound effect of removing mental barriers (unwinding the repetition). What this means is that while examining those objects that have collected in my apartment I see them unmediated by sentiment or history. I become a psychedelic Marie Kondo with the ability to edit my home with extreme prejudice, seeing any object as dead or sparking joy, necessary or unnecessary.
Acid and cleaning go well together. Dirt, dust, mildew and grime are intolerable in this state. Hot soapy water and clean gleaming surfaces are very satisfying. Though you may take a lot of detours, you will eventually get shit done.
Music sounds better on acid. I am not exaggerating when I tell you that listening to Little Richard’s song I Don’t Know What You Got But It’s Got Me while mopping the floor and high on acid may be one of the more profound musical experiences of my young life. The emotional content of the song becomes raw and immediate, punching through spacetime; it feels like the top of my head were coming off live in the studio in 1971; reader, I had to stop mopping just to cry.
Acid develops a sensitivity to the needs of house plants. I’m not yet quite sure how to describe this. Before psychedelics I did not care about plants; any plant I owned would eventually die. After psychedelics I now own many thriving plants. Though the colors are more intense on acid, the photosynthesizing green of plants is in particular more vibrant. One feels as if one can see the light that composes the plant itself; the living green glows. This visual aid, as it turns out, is helpful while tending to these house plants. It becomes obvious, while on acid, whether a plant is happy or not.
September Plant Report, 2021, Hope Gangloff
