A panic attack can cause a regular marijuana user to quit,
according to psychiatrists studying the effects of marijuana. This is good
news. The bad news is that only a small number of regular users experience
panic attacks. So, we have to continue to deal with this dimwit sector of our
population, listening to their trite, pathetic entreaties to allow them to get
high legally. It’s not unlike listening to a child rationalize why an allowance
is an entitlement regardless of chores completed.
Tiresome are the TV shots of various groups speaking up for
the legalization of pot. Invariably, whoever the spokesperson, there is the
dribble of how it is not harmful and somehow rights are being violated because
they are deprived of their smoke. All their points are made in short inarticulate
phrases; even when longer sentences are attempted the result is jagged,
hesitant, and often ungrammatical blurt-out. To wit, local Portland
TV media aired a sound bite from a pot-smoking granny decked in a green
leafy costume at the annual Seattle Hempfest: “They discriminate us,” she said.
Their pleas are nothing more than a milder form of a the
desperation from a pathetic addict selling out shoes and friends while begging
for a fix: “Please, just give me the dope and everything will be okay.”
For how long?
One of the most traditional of arguments is that it does not
harm others: “What I do to my body is my business.”
To this, I say get out of my way. At the risk of sounding selfish to that poor victim of
discrimination, the pothead, after you smoke the pot in your parents’ basement
-- stay there.
In the community college English classroom where I teach, I
know who you are: you are the one who blurts things out that don’t fit into the
classroom discussion; or you are the one who laughs robustly at something only
you and perhaps another pothead find humorous; or you are one of the students
who feigns attention but then gets narced out when called on and haven’t the
first idea what’s going on. But mostly, you are the one who rarely does better
than a “C’ because you can’t pull your THC-laden brain out of a sleep state,
and you remain in bed until noon
each day.
This being said, I am entirely on the side of the truly
ailing who need the drug for comfort. Yes, I’m one of those who says it is a
drug and should be treated as such – just like Vicoden, not like alcohol. And
here is your opening potheads, let me have it, my hypocritical self, me. Say to
me: alcohol causes disease, car accidents, and is involved in more crimes than
marijuana, so why is it legal and not cannabis? Alright you said it, and here
is what I say:
What you say is correct, and at the risk at stealing a
talking point from the NRA, it’s people that misuse alcohol, not alcohol. So,
you say, why can’t responsible people use marijuana, just like responsible
alcohol drinkers? Well, because the culture of the pot smoker says that pot
somehow is helpful to one’s well-being, and therefore the calm, mellow high
they have going contributes to the social serenity of life for everyone. Ick.
Pot smokers wake up in the morning to the bong in the living room, come home
from work or school to that very same deity on the coffee table, and remain in
a funk until they munch themselves to sleep. Frequently, day-in and day-out.
Next time when you pass Habitat for Humanity, ask how many
volunteers smoked pot. Or, drop by a place where teen or adult coaches
volunteer at a sports camp. Or for that matter, ask anywhere people are giving
of themselves for the benefit of others. I’ll bet you get a lot of big fat
zeros. Sure, you’ll see them at Occupy movements where the only work required
is, well, to occupy space – something the potheads do extraordinarily well. Or,
oh boy, do they ever turn out in droves – 150,000 at the Seattle Hemp fest – to
support their own “right” to slump on the couch and puff their way into
slackerville.
Being a little hard on the potheads aren’t you, Joe? Yes,
because, like I said, they are in my way.
I have family members and friends whose lives are going no where, and for
the most part those pot smokers, whether it be to proliferate their numbers,
or spread the good news of their ilk, are infesting more and more youth. I see
the youths lose jobs or perform poorly; many with bright futures prefer the
pastures of la-la land, and all this drains families financially, emotionally,
and spiritually.
Got a lot of pent-up anxiety toward those who smoke weed,
don’t you Joe? Yes, I do because I once was a pothead. Boy was I. I was
introduced to the drug at age 14, and I stayed high daily until I was 16. That
was every day. Before I started toking, I was a decent student, played ice
hockey on a team, and had a paper route. Most importantly, I found I could make
girls laugh, and at 14 girls were everything. Then two friends and I pursued pot
instead. We “toked down” before school, skipped classes to smoke during the
school day, and puffed more after school; getting a lid (ancient lingo for a
$10 bag of pot) was the central part of our everyday lives. Our conversation,
go figure, centered around how ridiculous it was that pot was not legal.
Basically though, our lives centered around nothing else.
Well, you guessed it: Cs and Ds in school, no more sports,
no more paper route. But there was hope with the girls. It must have been those
short moments before I went to smoke a joint that I was able to put forth a
kind of confident charm, and I realized some girls even “liked” me in the way
of wanting to be my girlfriend. But I sabotaged this.
It was when I was just a few months older than 16 when I
came out of the two-year weed-induced sleep. I started to feel “paranoid” every
time I smoked. We three buddies discussed this and figured it was a part of
smoking, and for awhile even looked at it as a good thing. It was part of the high,
the high that also made fresh snow twinkle, nonsensical jokes hilarious, and
long stream-of-conscious talking by one of us accepted by the others. Somehow
the paranoia which produced anxiety around people was viewed as introspective
and deep thinking when the three of us were alone together. I can remember the
exact moment I knew the price of pot cost me my dignity. A cute blonde girl at
the local Dairy Queen liked me. Her name was Sandy . We went to the beach together, and she
seemed tickled every time I visited her at the DQ. Until one night. It was late
summer and warm and, as usual, we three buddies met for a joint. I went to
visit Sandy ,
but was very paranoid. I remember stammering, then talking in sentences with jumbled
words. I did not even understand myself. As my panic grew, it became worse. It
was like I felt the need to talk but had nothing to say. She looked at me
bewildered at first, and explained that
she did not know what I was talking about. Then she looked frightened and
mentioned that I should leave. I went home into my basement and did not come
out until the next morning. I did not try to see her for about a week because I
knew I messed up everything. When I did see her she was standoffish. I felt
like a troll. But I never smoked pot again. I wanted the pot to get out of my
way.
