Under Pressure

Nitrous oxide, N₂O, is a fuel racing crews use to propel their cars hundreds of miles an hour. Under intense pressure, it allows the same engine to produce more power. Blends of N₂O fuel rockets. They might include, for example, nitroglycerin, which is a drug carried on ambulances to dilate blood vessels, to let more blood through. Nitroglycerin is also one of the most explosive substances in the world.

N₂O leads to substantial increases in performance over short periods of time, but the stress on the engine is astonishing. "There's an element of sustainable that's been always missing," I say about my life when an investment banker turned energy healer makes this analogy between destroyed N₂O engines and an adrenaline-filled life. He nods.

That speed, that speed—it'll wear you down. Life with "entropy whipping through it," as war writer Michael Herr says. For me it's been a decade of changing countries, incessant newness, horrible men, sinking far too deep into stories of extreme abuse. Most recently, Afghanistan: its adrenaline, then the aftershocks. Dozens of veterans tell me war is "life going 100 miles per hour." One hundred to zero is very difficult. One hundred miles per hour leaves a lot of aftermath behind.

With N₂O, cars race twice that. A chemical reaction fuels the speed—literally fire. Everything we feel is a chemical, too. At that speed, it's not helpful for someone in stasis, a friend or doctor perhaps, to say, "try sitting still," or, "be careful you don't catch fire too."

It's a young man's game. Conversations don't dwell on sustainability or aftermath. They dwell on speed, thrill, power. "It's just a lot of fun," I hear.

Nitrous oxide is also laughing gas: used to relax patients before pain, often abused for its euphoric effect. Inextricable: the fire, the words, the war, the healing, the feeling, the movement, the beauty, the darkness, the lover, the dreams, the imbalance, the pain.