My Dad’s 60th was different, to say the least. His birthday was earlier this year and I was scratching my head when thinking of what to get him. His love for Darrell Lea liquorice can only be stretched out for about 15 years, so I was feeling stuffed for choice. What do you get the near-pensioner who has everything? Well, I got him the gift that keeps giving – four MDMA capsules and tickets to our favourite band, of course.
Doing MDMA with any family member can be a surreal experience but gurning with your Dad is… a lot. In my experience, doing drugs with the person who raised me went further than the lovey-dovey chats and filthy chain-smoking. I mean this quite literally – we laughed, we cried, we chewed, and we tackled our family trauma. Here’s what I learned the night I did disco bickies with my Dad:
We Are Legit The Same Person
People have always said that my Dad and I are two halves of the same brain-cell. Albeit, I couldn’t help but truly appreciate our similarities when we were having a yew. We both deal with our panic through anger, we always ask customer service employees how their day is going and we’re both queer. Dad came out to me as bisexual that night, and it goes to show that the apple doesn’t fall too far from the gay bar.
Some Things Are Better Left Unsaid
Unfortunately, I can’t go into too much detail but let’s just say I didn’t need to know about Dad’s sex life (or lack thereof). I also could’ve survived without the stories of previous flings and one instance of star-crossed love – especially when it happened seven years before he met my mother. I’m sure he felt the exact same way about his son’s sexcapades and judging by the underlying awkwardness at brekky the next morning – it was definitely better to keep some parts of ourselves, to ourselves.
Other Things Do Need Talking About
Dad and I sorted out a lot of trauma while we minged. He told me about the time he found a suicide victim, a patient he knew very well, while he was working as a Nurse at my age – he had never told me that before. Let alone received counselling.
I told him about my struggles with an eating disorder in high school and how his reaction from panic to anger after finding out had made the situation worse, much worse. He apologised but pointed out that I would’ve done the exact same thing – he’s right.
We bawled as we listened to one another, like that scene from Midsommar, and now I feel my relationship with him has never been cleaner or healthier. MDMA is one hell of a drug.
Music Is The Window To The Soul
We saw ‘They Might Be Giants’ live that night, a band that Dad and I have loved since I was in year-one. While we moshed out during their show, I saw that Dad was tearing-up and laughing at the same time. His reason? Nostalgia. He was remembering our morning drives to my primary school in his old Barina and how we would always play their badly scratched CD. I would’ve hugged him on the spot, but he had to vomit shortly after.
The music we played during ‘kick-ons’ (if you can call it that when you’re with your Dad) also brought out some weird shit. For example, finding out that Dad was nicknamed “big boy acid” in his twenties could only have come up from listening to White Rabbit by ‘Jefferson Airplane’. Better yet, later seeing Dad thrash-out to Drummer Song by ‘Florence + The Machine’ let me see the young, druggy, bohemian man that my Mum had told so many stories about, but that I thought I would never get to see.
Our Parents Aren’t As Put Together As We Think
This is practical rather than emotional, but don’t forget that your parents aren’t spring-chooks. Dad hadn’t done an upper in nearly 30 years before that night and while we snagged some cherry-flavoured chewy after the concert, the poor bastard had to gurn for three hours without. Needless to say, betadine can’t help a mouth ulcer the size of a thumb and Dad was on a liquid diet for nearly a week. His MDMA comedown was a whole other story, and now I know that I never want to be a dial-up therapist, ever.
Image Sources: PicsArt @dinaaaaaah, 20th Television, GIPHY.
