High Price

biology (the drug’s effects on the brain) and environment that determines drug effects on human behavior. This is why attempts to characterize drug effects on human behavior by solely examining the brain after drug administration are inadequate and naive.
    My set and setting the day I kicked Melissa and her aunt out of Betty’s apartment weren’t especially conducive to a “good high.” That Oprah episode had raised the possibility in my mind that sexy women were likely to be predators and con artists—so my mind-set wasn’t likely to make me feel comfortable getting high with women I didn’t already know and trust. My reduced tolerance also increased the chances that I would experience paranoia from smoking more than I was used to handling. With THC, the primary active ingredient in marijuana, higher doses taken by inexperienced users increase the odds of negative side effects like paranoia or anxiety.
    Set and setting can explain a lot about the variability of effects reported by users who take the same drug and about why different environments can produce different behavioral responses to drugs. The divergent responses of the Rat Park rats (see chapter 5) that eschewed morphine in favor of family and socializing with other rats, and the isolated rats who took dose after dose of the drug, are one example. Another one is the differing experiences of smoking cocaine found in Wall Street traders and among homeless cocaine smokers. The homeless people experience far more paranoia and fear than the executives do because wealthier users are more likely to be sheltered from frightening consequences like being arrested. The setting of the drug use can profoundly influence behaviors that are often attributed to the drugs themselves.
    The night I got high with Melissa and her aunt, I couldn’t sleep at all. Now I know that adequate sleep is essential for the health and survival of an individual and that severe sleep loss, even without drug use, can cause hallucinations and paranoia. As a result, even the next day, when I tried to make a deposit at the bank, the paranoia was still with me. Standing in line, I felt as though the cameras were trained on me specifically. I got so freaked out that I left without depositing my UPS paycheck. But I realized early on that this was the result of smoking so much weed and simply waited for it to wear off.
    And fortunately for me—and, as it turned out, my academic future—Melissa had a serious crush on me. Several days later, when I ran into her again, she came over immediately and asked me if I was all right. I laughed off the incident and before long, we were seeing each other. Melissa would become my girlfriend for the next year and a half.
    About a month later, Melissa introduced me to cocaine. One of the local dealers was also pursuing her, though she wasn’t much impressed by him. He asked if she indulged, seeing an opportunity to spend time with her; she said yes but often secretly stashed the cocaine he gave her so we could do it together. I wasn’t especially interested in the drug. But when she took it out for the first time, I didn’t think it would be cool to say no.
    It was still 1988; at the time you couldn’t turn on the TV or see a headline without being confronted with a story about the horrors of crack. I still knew nothing more than street lore about drugs, but even that far into the 1980s among the people I knew, powder cocaine had retained its glamorous associations with wealth, celebrity, and sex. Snorting it was perceived as fun rather than risky or particularly addictive. I didn’t see any harm in trying it and thought that Melissa knew what she was doing, although I later learned that she wasn’t actually an experienced user.
    And sniffing my first line through a straw, I thought it was great. I had a sense of mastery and found relief regarding any anxieties that I might have been feeling about the evening. But while the drug made Melissa peppy and talkative, I found it calming and became more contemplative, perhaps because I also drank Schlitz malt liquor when I did lines. (Interestingly, although most drugs are not taken solo, little research focuses on the effects of drug combinations.)
    Like many Gil Scott-Heron fans, I’d also taken to writing poetry. After a few lines, I loved nothing better than writing. As many cocaine fans discover, while the drug can produce stimulation and mental clarity, you may also come to see the most banal