Never forget: The desert is where on “Insecure” Issa, Molly and Kelli take edibles and MDMA and finally have to face themselves.
has caught the wave. You probably either know someone who’s tripped there or have fallen down an internet rabbit hole and seen the experience unfold on your screen. The Google search “psychedelics and Joshua Tree” yields YouTube vlogs, confessionals and Reddit threads. One essay, posted to Medium by the writer Faye Lessler, is headlined: “I Took Magic Mushrooms in Joshua Tree National Park and Discovered the Meaning of Life.
In 2017, Elizabeth Xu and her friend rented an Airbnb in Joshua Tree called the Color Trip Trailer with the intention of doing acid for the first time there. The dwelling is drenched in fluorescent shades of neon, with shag rugs and string lights, and sits right across from the national park. “It was just the energy there,” Xu says. “Feeling safe because there’s no one around you. You’re in the desert. I knew to surrender to it.