Hey, man, thanks for another GREAT article! Regarding the first one, I thought it was the real thing... :-) Even if not, it's a marvelous story, and it actually says a lot. I stand by what I said...that IS how you write great song lyrics of the type Dylan did...by immediate, spontaneous instinct, not by mental calculation. Later you can usually go through what you got and fine-tune it a bit, but mostly it just happens right on the spot. But you've got to be in the right space to let it happen. Drugs are not a necessary ingredient to reach that space, but they can be used to do so. I prefer not going the drug route.

Great quote from the 2nd article: "I was one of those fools who think they're hip because they smoke pot."

Yeah. I was surrounded by fools like that from '69 through '79, and I could easily see the silliness of it all. I myself got marvelously stoned on about 3 occasions...which sufficed to satisfy my curiosity about it...and other than that I didn't bother. I had more meaningful ways to spend my time, money, and attention.

I also (like the Beatles and their entourage) found everything hysterically funny the first time I got stoned. Then things widened out to a point where it became downright frightening...because there were no reference points left from which to say "I'm here and that's over there..." I fought with that for ten minutes until I came down from the stone. Actually, my mind was being confronted with a spiritual truth, which I have later become aware of not through drugs but through spiritual investigation. It's a powerful truth, but I didn't know what to do with it at the time.

It has been said that marijuana "leads to harder drugs". Not exactly. A certain type of personality leads to harder drugs. And that type of personality is definitely attracted to softer drugs, and in fact, to any drug that is readily available...so it only appears that marijuana leads to harder drugs, in my opinion. The fact that it was illegal did help in its leading toward other illegal drugs, of course, due to whom you had to contact to get it. In my case, marijuana led to nowhere except deciding that it was something I didn't need or particulary want, though it was interesting.

Most people have a strong tendency toward addiction, the only question is...to what? I figured that in Bob's case the main drug of choice was alcohol (and tobacco!!!). The other stuff would have been minor in comparison.

If you look around in society, the main drugs of choice still are: alcohol, tobacco, caffeine, refined sugar, salt...ALL of which are legal, with some restrictions in the case of alcohol and tobacco (the 2 most obviously damaging to health). The illegal drugs are a much secondary problem, and they get far more press than they merit...mainly because they ARE illegal.

Then there are the behavioural drugs, such as: conspicuous consumption (mall-surfing), watching TV, playing video games, surfing the Net, yakking on Mudcat (Ouch!), sexual addiction (when the act becomes,let's say, somewhat divorced from the emotional foundation on which it might best reside), perusing pornography...and so on, and so on.

Who is not addicted? One in ten thousand. I would call such a person a spiritual master.

Another quote from the article: "I have come to recognize that smoke is anti-life and so I am now anti-smoke."

EXACTLY. That's why I was always strongly inclined not to smoke both marijuana and cigarettes. It IS anti-life to do so.

You want to write something amazing? Just grab a word or a phrase, like it says in the first article...and see where it goes. If you're open to the experience, and the time is right, it may go somewhere very powerful. If not, nothing much will happen.

I've hit spells when I could write a whole bunch of stuff that way, and other times when I couldn't. I don't worry anymore when the dry times come. Doesn't matter. The wave always comes in in its own good time.

- LH