I remember when California passed The Compassionate Use Act in 1996 (becoming the 1st State to legalize Medical Marijuana) my friends and I were floored. Until now our Pot Smokings greatest aspirations were to save up enough money to make the Pot Head Pilgrimage across the Ocean to the Netherlands. The destination being the Legendary City of Marijuana known as Amsterdam. The Mystical Metropolis where Weed was sold and smoked without legal or social persecution as No One Gave a Shit (a fucking Utopia as far as my Friends were concerned).
And now there it was the State of California a Pot Smokers Beacon of Hope, but it was a “So Close Yet So Far” Scenario for my Friends and I unfortunately. See while California legalized Medical Marijuana (which illuminated a lot of Foreign travel bullshit making it much easier to access than Amsterdam) you had to be a Legal Resident with a Doctor’s Prescription Card to reap the benefits of Medical Marijuana Legally.
So California felt as fucking far away as Andsterdajm as far as I was concerned. Thankfully for me over the past 22 years 29 states have Legalized (Medical OR Recreational) Marijuana use by persons over the age of 21.
When I was growing up I started smoking Weed around 15-16 years old and have continued to this very day. My Mom was the fucking antithesis of Ronnie Regan’s bullshit War On Drugs that labeled Marijuana a Gate Way Drug (Which has been proven to be false as Alcohol is the actual 1st intoxicant Teens try so FUCK OFF ALCHOL.
Anyway the point being my Mother was disgusted and appalled by anyone, (let alone her Son) using Marijuana, and spent years battling in vain to get me to quite smoking weed. She used the old school smell check when I would get home starting in High School in an attempt to detect the smell of Weed. The problem was my Mother had (and still doesn’t really) know what the fuck Weed smells like. This led to countless unfounded accusations because she mistook Incense, Petrulli Oil, Cloves, Cigarillo’s, Certain Cologne, and camp fire smoke just to name a few. In the end she caught me a few times when I was definitely Stoned, but only once did she find Weed. One evening She ran through my jacket pockets, and removed a fat ass Dime Bag yet never mentioned it to me ironically as it were.
. At the same time on the other side of the Cannabis Coin I spent just as many years futilely fighting to change my Mother’s negative view of Marijuana. I constantly fought to inform my Mother Marijuana had multiple Medical Uses, and wasn’t a killer narcotic like Crack. I argued that the Gate Way Drug Theory was bullshit. Was I really meant to believe if I smoked Weed on Wednesday I’d be robbing Old Ladies and shooting Heroin into my fucking neck?!!! Bullshit.
Now we fast forward to 2016 and I’m now in my 30’s and I was a married home owner living in the Great Southern Swamp. I was visiting my Father who was struggling against Liver Cancer because he wan’t people to remember him as he was not as a crippled, bed ridden living Corpse.
My Father loved to cook, hell thats an understatement. He had cooked dinner for me,my Wife, Himself, his 2nd Wife, and oddly my Mother. We were in the middle of eating I was seated at one end of the table and my Father at the other when my Mother (sitting to the right of my Father), and then it happened. My Father at that point was on a powerful as fuck Steroid that was causing mild insomnia (He slept 3-4 hours a night) and inhibiting his appetite. Now not just cooking food, but eating it as well was one of my Father’s true passions, and he quit Chemotherapy because he was too nauseous and fatigued to even think about eating shit.
My Mother leans over and all of a sudden she asked:
“Have you tired Marijuana???”
Now the answer was yes he had tried it once since getting sick. He had decided to try it at least once since he had nothing to loose (not like it kill him). The first hurdle for him (besides living in a state where Marijuana is still Illegal) was he was in his 70’s so who could he ask about getting Weed? He finally asked a close friend who had a Daughter who lived in The Rotten Apple and had a Dealer. Next my Father had obsessed about how much he should smoke ( take a couple hits of a joint? Smoke Half? Smoke it All? I think he was very weary of the affects and it made him rather uneasy.
The Daughter’s Dealer sent a Joint along to my Father along with the message to Please Smoke the Sample Joint and if my Father liked it to let him know. I didn’t have the pleasure of smoking with my Father, but my Younger Brother did. This was in part due to a phone call awhile before hand where I asked him to be there to help assist my Father’s inaugural Toking to make sure things went smoothly. It did accept no one informed my Father that due to its unique reverse tolerance (Marijuana has to build up in your system before you can experience the High which is why in most all cases a person won’t get Stoned the 1st or 1st few times the smoke.) he might need to keep going, but he figured once was enough for him.
I couldn’t get over what my Mother had said and couldn’t let it go until I found out why. It only took a couple of moths or so and I learned the real story.
Apparently my Mother has a very good friend who suffers from brutal insomnia (She would go DAYS without sleeping), and she to had a Daughter who happened to live in Colorado (The New Mecca for Marijuana in America). So inevitably my Mother’s Friend flew out to visit her Daughter, and while she was there visiting her Daughter suggested trying Marijuana to combat her ongoing contest against insomnia. My Mother’s friend thought why not and purchased some Weed from a local Dispensary (Marijuana is Legal for Medical AND Recreational Adult Use) and tried it. She was blown away as she had never imagined Marijuana would work nearly as well as it did. Since that trip She had been singing the praises of Marijuana to everyone She knew INCLUDING MY MOTHER.
Then in that instant I realized what the fuck was going on. Its damn near identical as to going to Court. You can go to Court and tell the Judge your innocent and he sends you to jail, BUT if you hire a Lawyer and he says the same fucking thing you did/would have all of a sudden the Judge starts listening.
And thats exactly what had happened with my Mother and her views of Marijuana. I could tell her till I was blue in the fucking face (and I did) about the benefits of Marijuana and all the bullshit propaganda BUT UNTIL HER GOOD FRIEND VOUCHED FOR THE BENEFITS OF MARIJUANA THROUGH HER PERSONAL EXPERIENCE was the convincing factor for my Mother’s drastic and positive attitude change towards Medical Marijuana.
Sometimes its not WHATS BEING SAID BUT WHO’S SAYING IT that matters.
Thanks for Reading,
Les Sober 