It’s 1967, and the 18-year-old fills in the shafts of his knee-high English riding boots with 500 capsules of high-quality, high-potency mescaline, an organic psychedelic derived from the Peyote cactus. He kick-starts the chopped Harley-Davidson he had purchased from a Hells Angel, and with his long hair and wool cape blowing behind him, flies his two-wheeled rocket ship over a myriad of lost highways, tripping on the powerful psychedelic he passes out to hippies he finds in his path.
Why he doesn’t die or go to prison might be attributed to the magic of the time. In 2026, this same man completes his journey from helter-skelter to elder, when his daughter texts him to come help with his baby granddaughters.
Yes, it’s my story, from riding choppers to fastening car seats, but there are thousands of Santa Cruz boomer stories about their lives forming such a circle. As author Abbie Rosner says, the tools we used back then to become the vanguard for reinventing youth can now teach us how to open our consciousness to be the vanguard for reinventing how we age. That is what Rosner is coming to Santa Cruz to talk about.
On Thursday, July 30, the Santa Cruz Psychedelic Society launches its first Psychedelic Saturday gathering of 2026 at the London Nelson Community Center with author Abbie Rosner’s presentation of her book, Psychedelics and the Counterculture of Aging. Rosner writes about older adults who are rediscovering psychedelics as a tool to reconfigure aging, loss, purpose and mortality. She refers to herself as a “badass elder”, continuing to explore the intersection of older adults and psychedelics. She sees what society tells us about what it is to be older and says that does not fit us at all. “We’re not sitting on a time of decline, of irrelevance. There’s this emerging phenomenon of aging boomers going back to psychedelics to help reframe their experience of older age; deepening the spirit, connecting to their authentic selves, connecting to their youthful joy and wonder. Potentiating.”
It is an appropriate opening act for an organization that is reinventing itself. After several years of community events, the Santa Cruz Psychedelic Society went quiet when its previous leadership moved on and its downtown meeting space closed. New co-executive directors Colin Disheroon and Elene Johas Teener are rebuilding the organization, recruiting a new board and planning a new series of educational and social events. Disheroon says the goal is not to encourage psychedelic use, but to create a place where researchers, therapists, physicians, scientists and community members can safely exchange information as psychedelic medicine becomes increasingly visible.
The timing is good. Research into compounds such as psilocybin continues to expand, particularly for treatment-resistant depression, end-of-life anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder. While federal approval for therapeutic use remains limited, public interest is picking up. The City of Santa Cruz voted in 2020 to make enforcement against naturally occurring psychedelics among the city’s lowest law-enforcement priorities. But Disheroon believes many residents misunderstand where those policies apply.
One of the Society’s long-term goals, he says, is public education about the legal boundaries between incorporated Santa Cruz, which has adopted decriminalization measures, and unincorporated areas of Santa Cruz County, where those protections do not necessarily exist. The organization also hopes to support broader decriminalization efforts while emphasizing public safety. For now, the emphasis is less political than communal. Disheroon believes Santa Cruz has thousands of people interested in psychedelic science and healing, but few opportunities for them to gather in one place.
“The psychedelic community in Santa Cruz is broad, but it’s also kind of disconnected,” he said. “There’s not a central hub for people to meet and connect.” Spiritually attuned singer-songwriter Stephen Walters opens the July 30event, hoping to bring the audience together, to feel included, with songs like“Nothing Could Be Separate”. Then Abbie Rosner takes the stage, followed by opportunities for conversation, music and community building. Co-executive director Teener, a Santa Cruz psychotherapist, says, “It’s going to be fun”.
Boomers were born to be wild. They did fly so high they thought they were never going to die. But now the generation that was committed to not trusting anyone over 30 is finding new ways to connect with and mentor people under 30. Whether or not you think psychedelics are the future of mental health, aging doesn’t have to mean shrinking, it can mean expanding – perhaps the most psychedelic idea of all.
