D is for Dope

A couple of weeks ago, I went to the store for a mere 40 minutes, and while I was gone, Dave and his mom had the mother of all blowouts. 

Thankfully, the kids were also gone (in CA with my mom for 2 weeks).

I think I've mentioned that when she gets mad, she says things I wouldn't say to a dog.  She also brings up the laundry list of your entire life's mistakes, real or imagined.

One of our imaginary sins that came up during this shouting match (lovingly held outside so all the neighbors can know their business) was that she thinks Dave and I are "dope fiends" because we are OK with marijuana having been made legal in Colorado.

The funny thing about that statement is that Dave has NEVER tried an illegal drug in his life.  It's downright un-American, if you ask me.

She and I almost got in to it a week before on the same issue.

There was a traveling nurse that came to our house to give her an insurance-company-mandated physical.  MIL was telling me what a lovely person that nurse was (which, to her mind, means the nurse agreed with everything the MIL asked her about, thus confirming that MIL is, once again, right in all ideals).  One of the things they talked about was weed.  Nurse agreed with MIL that weed is the root of all evil.  Nurse used to work in a prison and claimed that every single man behind bars ever started down the road to the big house by smoking a joint.  Nurse also told MIL that it's been proven that marijuana is the ONLY drug in existence that NEVER leaves the body.  That it stays in your cells and never leaves.

At that point, I'd heard enough.  We were driving to the grocery store, just she and I, and I'd had it.  I said, "That nurse was talking out her ass."

MIL looked shocked and said, "Well, she's a nurse, so I think she knows what she's talking about."  I said, "Never happened.  Your body completely regenerates every cell it has about every 7 years or so, depending on the cell type.  NOTHING stays in your body forever."

I went on to give her my views on addiction.  Here they are, for good or for ill:

I think addicts are wired to be addicts.  I think there may be things in their life that they need to escape from, some of them have horrific things that they should be able to escape from, but some people do it with addiction, others do not.

I strongly believe that if someone is going to be an addict, it doesn't matter what drug they start with.   My brother grew up in the same unstable, dysfunctional household.   I might even go so far as to say that I had it worse, considering the Very Bad Things that happened because I am female.  (No one in our house ever touched me - see previous post for the story.)  I've done the exact same drugs my brother's done.  (I almost let that slip out with her, too!  I can only imagine the firestorm that would've started.  Not to mention the filing away and savoring of that little tidbit until her next tantrum.)  My brother is an addict that has had a very hard time getting his life together.  I never got addicted to drugs or alcohol and have managed to reasonably keep my life on some sort of "normal" track.

Everyone is addicted to something.  For the MIL it's cigarettes and (as I've recently discovered) copious amounts of alcohol.  For some it's food.  For some it's being a dick.   (Please misread that last one as you will. hah!) 

For me it's yarn.  And spending money.  And yarn.  And spending money on yarn.

I really have tried quite a lot of drugs over the years of my well-spent youth. 

Weed:  Tried it in high school a few times.  Bored me to tears.  My friends would be cracking up and getting the munchies; I'd be asleep in the corner.

Cocaine:  My high school sweetheart had several cousins heavily involved in the powder.  One worked at a company that makes (among other things) the sauces they use at Baskin-Robbins.  That place was fuckin' Candyland.  Most of the employees would spend their lunch hours snorting up in the parking lot.  He also had a cousin who dealt coke. 

The first time I tried it, we went to the dealer-cousin's house.  The house was modest, but lovely.   They set up some on a small mirror laid on the pool table.  I'd been so terrified by all the Just Say No propaganda that I was sure my heart would literally explode the first time I tried it.  I turned to Sweetheart and said, "Promise me if anything happens, you will call an ambulance."  He promised he would.   He didn't even laugh at me. 

I was so nervous that when I bent to take that first sniff (rolled $100 bill at the ready), that I started laughing and accidentally blew the stuff all over the pool table.  Cousin and Sweetheart were both patient and didn't get mad.  They just set up again, and I did it right that time.

Don't mistake me.   Neither one of them were pressuring me or cared whether I did it or not.  I was curious and wanted to try it.

Sweetheart and I used to coke the fuck out three or four times a year.  4th of July and New Year's Eve, we'd go to different cousins of his in Sacramento.   His female cousin there, T, was a heavy construction equipment driver and always had good stuff.  We'd stay with her and her husband (and their kids) and party all night long for a few days at a time.  (Never in front of the kids.  They'd get sent down the block to stay with her parents.)

The thing with me and coke is that I'm way too fucking cheap for that crap.  I was always a hyperactive person anyway, and I couldn't see paying $100 for something that made me MORE hyper but only lasted twenty minutes.  It was always free and it was always a blast!   But I'd never "waste" my money on that.

Meth:  Yes.  I've tried it.  When I first moved to Tucson, I met and was hanging out with this group of people my age.  I suck at names, but I do remember this one ginger boy they called Peaches (because of his hair and all the fuzz on his arms?).  They all worked in construction (well, not the girls), so there was easy and copious access to drugs.  They called it Crystal in the 90s.  I'm rather dim, so it didn't occur to me until much later that Crystal Meth was, you know... Meth. 

Anyway, like most of my drug mini-adventures, I decided to see what all the fuss was about. 

It suuuuuuuuucked.  

I was up for three days.   We were all hanging out in the same house for this long weekend.   I did a few lines and that was all.   Up for Three.  Days.   At the end, I told Peaches, "I can't stop talking.  I'm annoying MYSELF and I can't shut up."

I somehow managed to clench my jaws and continuously talk for three days straight.  I still have jaw issues due to that mess.

Like most of my drug mini-adventures, I end up asking myself, "How is this fun, exactly??"

Random drug stories:

Worst high I ever had:   In college, tried a "cocoa-puff".  That's a cocaine-laced joint.  The weed is trying to take you down, the coke is trying to pull you up, and you are just fucked up in the middle.

Funniest high I ever saw:  When I was in high school, I hung out with mods and punks.  There was this cheerleader that had a crush on one of the punk rock boys.  She was always bugging us to hang out.

In my little town, there was a place where ALL the kids went to party, no matter what clique you ran with.   It was called the Dykes.  It was a big canal out in the middle of nowhere.  To get to it, you had to know where the turnoff was - a tiny side street off a country road.  Once you took the turnoff, the little road went steeply up, then made a nearly 90-degree turn, and then sloped down to the area where the canal was.  About once every few months, when leaving, some kid would go straight and end up with a broken axle.  Also, when you were actually at the canal at night, if you were looking toward that road off in the dark, you'd see nothing, then.... lights.  Tiny lights of the headlights of approaching cars would appear.

The cool thing about the Dykes is that the farmers who lived further down the road (and, I assume, owned all that land) didn't care if we partied there, as long as no one got hurt or left their beer cans about.

Ok, so with my friends, they did a lot of drugs.   Heavy shit like PCP.  This was pre-me-trying-anything, so I'd just hang out, sip a beer (maybe) and those of our group that didn't partake would sort of babysit and drive those that did. 

Cheerleader sauntered over one night and was trying to schmooze up to the boy she had a crush on.  He was a PCP user, and to try to get in with him, she was bugging him to let her try it.  She weighed slightly more than her birth weight and was claiming she could hang and wouldn't let up, so finally he let her have a hit.   (They'd dip their joints in the PCP liquid.) 

After a few short moments, she was obliterated.   I noticed her staring off toward the dark road, and as I followed her gaze I saw.... lights.  She shouted, "COPS!!" and took off running.   We all looked at each other in bewilderment.  We saw white dots, no red or blue.  (The cops would come out occasionally, but more often then not, they'd have a beer with us and leave.)

We let her run.

A few hours later, when we were ready to leave, CrushBoy said, "We can't leave her."  I was all, "Can't we?", but was overruled by nicer friends. 

We went off in to the field to find her dumb ass.

We found her, all right.

She was entangled in a barbed wire fence.  It was so damn funny!  She was trying to call for help but as quietly as she could so the "cops" wouldn't hear her. 

It was like a scene from The Fly:
"help me!  help meeee!"

We untangled her, put her in a car, drove her home, put her on her front porch, rang the bell, and left.

Now, those of you thinking of Tetanus, don't worry.  It was what passes for Winter in Clovis, CA, and she was jeaned and jacketed and unbloodied.  Most of what was caught in the fence was her enormous down jacket and her even bigger, '80s-styled blonde hair.

So, yes, weed is legal in CO.  Have I tried it?  Not since the '80s.  It's not quite the point in CO where you can walk in to a dispensary and walk out well-stocked.  One still needs a medical card at this point.  But soon, my friends, soon....

hah!

I may try it again.   Dave has expressed vague interest.  We'd definitely go the edible route if we were to try it.  We can't stand smoke - blech.

I have some questions about the whole legalizing weed thing.

First there's this:
3.9 tons of marijuana confiscated by Texas Highway Patrol

What are they going to do with all that weed?  Wouldn't they be smart to sell the confiscated drugs to a state that has legalized?  An auction to dispensary owners, like they do with confiscated cars, houses, etc. 

Would that make Texas a drug dealer?

But seriously, how much debt could be erased by selling that amount of illegal to some place that has made it legal?  Would it be wrong to use that "drug money" to help schools?

Personally, I think all drugs should be legalized and regulated.  Prostitution, too.  But that's just me.

My jaw still aches, Ruth!