Essay: A Cautionary Tale (At 18, Did I REALLY Say That?)

When I was preparing Memoir Madness for publication, I combed through the manuscript for small edits and revisions, tightening up the text – I tend to overwrite – and fixing minor flaws.

Of course, a text can never be “perfect,” but I thought it was worth one more go-through before committing it to print publication.

And I was moving along at a fast clip.

“Not too bad,” I thought. The text seemed polished enough, and I was feeling very pleased with myself.

Then about halfway through, I stopped short at this passage, where I, in 2004, attributed a quote to my 18-year-old self:

I have this thing about the way time moves; sometimes, it zooms by (when you’re having a good time, like at a party), and, sometimes, it crawls.

Cherokee seemed like two years.

Maybe it’s because I didn’t know when I was going to get out. Then there’s acid time: super slow and rapturous – maybe that’s why so many ex-heads turn into Jesus Freaks.

It has been so hard to put down completely, though I know I must never drop acid, ever again.

Both groovy and scary.

I keep telling Jeff that we can mimic the psychedelic experience without acid, but, as much as I might wish otherwise, that’s not exactly true.

Acid does magnify the psychedelic experience a hundred times over. That trip on Christmas Eve was the best ever.

I just wish acid weren’t so dangerous.

I stopped short.

Really? At 18, Did I really say this?

I know how I was at that age, and introspective I was not. Flighty and flaky, yes, but not prone to deep thinking.

The entire passage felt unauthentic.

Fake.

So I stopped editing the manuscript and spent two days combing through my letters to Jeff, to look for anything that could corroborate that long passage.

Nada.

Not even close. Maybe a few glimmers here and there, but it was a stretch. I did suggest to Jeff that we could mimic an acid trip in other ways; also, there were a few references to “acid time” and about how Cherokee seemed like forever, but nothing about the movement of time in general.

In that 2010 revision, I attributed 2004 introspection to my 1969 self – and I didn’t discover the error until two years later.

In 2012, to bring this passage back to 2004, where it belonged, I spent two days rewriting it:

...My incarceration felt like a lifetime.

In a sense, it was a lifetime, a lifetime spent questioning and second guessing my own sanity.

Even now, I obsess about the way time moves, how it zips by when you’re happy and having fun and crawls through difficult and boring events.

Cherokee seemed like two years – perhaps because I didn’t know when I was going to be released –

And when I finally received a copy of my hospital records, I was shocked to see that my time there had been less than two months.

Then there was my LSD time, super slow and rapturous, the inverse of regular time: elastic minutes stretching to hours, hours to days, days to months.

Perception warp.

Ecstasy. Religious experience.

Perhaps explaining why so many ex-acid heads eventually turned to Jesus – The Rapture – as evidenced by the 1960’s popularity of Reverend Blessitt’s “His Place” on Sunset Boulevard.

For years after my last acid trip, I struggled with my resolve to quit.

So difficult to quit...although I knew I could never again touch acid.

Back and forth...acid, no acid, acid, no acid, teetering between heightened sensory perception and risking blown synapses.

As I worked through altered-perception addiction, I insisted that we – Jeff and I – could mimic the psychedelic experience with black lights, music, sex, and, perhaps, a bit of weed, but, as much as I might have wished it so, that wasn’t exactly true.

Acid had magnified my psychedelic experience a hundred times over and no amount of pseudo-tripping could ever replicate LSD’s effects.

No denying it: my Christmas Eve trip with Stoney had been the best ever.

“I just wish acid weren’t so dangerous,” I often told myself.

Before my commitment, I had already quit for good, but my craving for the mind-altering and life-changing LSD, a multi-year struggle.

Slowly, though, my desire disappeared.

My letters consistently referred to my desire not to take LSD anymore, but feeling conflicted about it, which matches my memory.

However, that first version simply was not authentic, just wishful thinking on my part. In many ways, the first passage is more interesting and compelling, but it was fiction masquerading as the truth.

The final revision is probably not as interesting as the original, but it’s more accurate in that it represents the thoughts and reflections of a 53-year-old woman looking back on her 18-year-old self, instead of the older Jennifer trying to recreate someone that simply did not exist in that 1969 time period.

I now better understand how memoirists can fall into these little traps and allow small untruths to creep into their work.

I probably would have gotten away with this flawed passage, but it would have pricked at my conscience. It’s one thing for a minor gaffe to slip through without my realization, but, in my mind, this one was too big to ignore.

This is just a cautionary tale for all writers who are thinking about writing a memoir, how flawed perceptions may explain why memoirists often get their timelines so wrong.

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Excerpts from Memoir Madness: Table of Contents

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“A Cautionary Tale: at 18, Did I Really Say That?” © copyright 2011 - present, by Jennifer Semple Siegel, may not be reprinted or reposted without the express permission of the author.