Too High In Public.

I recently ran into an old friend who reminded me of an episode from long ago.
 
We were going to see Todd Rundgren at the Zoo in OKC. We lived about 3 hours away. We also knew the back roads all the way there. So we smoked up the entire way. I was the kind of high where you think every living being on the planet knows you are stoned and had the accompanying paranoia that inevitably goes with such a feeling. The munchies were upon us hard by the time we hit the city. Being outvoted, we wound up at a MacDonalds. A really busy MacDonalds. The drive thru was backed way up, so being outvoted again, we went inside. It was even more packed. All registers were open and about 7 people deep. If I wasn't starving so bad I would've turned and walked out. But hunger makes you do what is necessary, so we scattered out thru the crowd with me trying to find a quiet place on the edge. I wound up between two severe looking older gentlemen. They had the look of white southern Baptist preachers of the fire and brimstone type. I stood quietly, being careful not to make eye contact with anyone lest it lead to conversation. After what seemed an eternity I finally ordered my mystery meat burger. For some reason the employee didn't ask for my money until she handed me my food. I paid and got a handful of coins for change. I was grabbing my food with one hand while shoving the change in my pocket and ready to run far away from this fluorescent hell full of southern Baptist preachers getting ready to condemn me to hell. In my haste I forgot that my front pocket had a huge hole in it. The change went down my leg and scattered into the crowd in all directions. It wasn't even an option to go after it. I was not going to crawl around all those people on my hands and knees in the state of mind I was in. So I reverted to nonchalantly walking along as if nothing happened. Suddenly, one of the preachers grabbed me by the arm and spun me around and said "Sir! You dropped your change!" He had a menacing look on his face, or so it appeared to me. I recoiled away from him and said "Don't touch me!" I think that's what I said, I may have just hissed like a cat. But whatever it was, it worked because it was his turn to recoil as if he had touched Lucifer himself. I beat a path to the car. The others stayed inside and ate. They obviously didn't feel the heavy spell of southern preachers all over the place. Or maybe they weren't as high as I was. Or maybe they can hold their shit together better than me. To this day, I've never been inside another Macdonalds. Mainly because nowadays it takes me 2 1/2 days to shit one of their burgers out. But also because there could be hippy grabbing southern preachers in there. Ain't nobody got time fo that.

 

That sums it up nicely! It wasn't social anxiety. It was stoned anxiety! The kind where you think every one knows you're stoned and they're all cops. Or preachers. Arresting you or condemning you to hell.