I remember one time I was coming down off some acid, I had drifted off, not asleep, but not awake either. The room was golden hour yellow from a sun refracted through the smoke of a distant forest fire. I was unaware of time, totally chill in the serotonin soaked moment. I remember hearing a …
shitload of crows cawing in slightly offset unison when a sound starts ramping up. It was a sound we all were trained to recognize because of the civil defense flyers in school. “WTF‽” My brain changed gears and a cold sweat because the siren was howling in a wavering attack tone. I got up …
And went to the window. Pulling back the curtain revealed the orange looking sky with a couple yellow streaks that looked to be coming in from above. That can’t be good. I thought I could see little bright spots at the end of the yellow streaks. That really can’t be good. …
A few more moments of my stomach flip-flopping in not entirely unrelated to the remaining psychedelic changes made me cough. Then, the siren changed. The wavering became longer and volume trailed off. It was quiet again. Even the crows had been put off by the siren. I felt sick, and confused. …
I pulled the drape open again and looked again at those yellow streaks in the sky, and after moving my head around some, I noticed that the ends of the streaks weren’t headed to the ground, but they weren’t, I fucked up the perspective and as I watched the bright spots kept going overhead. …
“Jets … contrails … fuck.“ I turned on my stereo and the announcer said it was 12:03 PM. It was the monthly test of the sirens. Noon, 1st Wednesday of the month. Dazed and Confused came on the stereo. And then I threw up.