A Friend in Weed is a Friend Indeed

Removing cannabis from the equation of my life would surely have yielded a completely different outcome. Yet like everyone else I’m unwilling to put my name to this.

I smoked my first spliff at fifteen outside a church in our town with my best friend, six years before my first cigarette. Having denounced the herb for a while, I was suddenly curious what all the fuss was about. The essential ingredient we got from her little sister’s stash, a birthday present. As we didn’t have enough tobacco, dried rose petals and tea were added to the mix. Needless to say, it burned like... and didn’t do the trick. I was told it never does the first time.

After that it was mainly at parties, then in the park after school, eventually out back during school. It was always available. Sometimes I chipped in, rarely bought (once, twice?). I may have smoked on my own once.

I wasn’t exactly burdened with responsibility at the time. I had a lot of fun, I wasn’t missing much in school and it wasn’t hurting anyone.

My ultra-conservative parents didn’t agree. They had me pee in a cup every couple of weeks and threatened with ‘rehab’ and ‘boarding school’. They felt betrayed; any existing relationship fell apart.

Regardless, I wouldn’t have classed myself as a stoner. This was not much of a relationship, more of a casual acquaintance, a pastime like any other.

What changed at university was a dramatic increase in free time coupled with an even quieter location: Forty thousand people, idyllic, not much else. Weekly pick-up. Sometimes twice a week. You seem calmer dear. Smoking on the way to classes makes the slow pace easier to handle. With friends, guests, it’s a social affair. In the evenings, for insomniacs, it’s a given. It’s the best hangover cure. There really isn’t much to do; smoking makes the little there is to do rather pleasant. We’re on intimate terms now.

Moving in with my dealer later doesn’t exactly change matters.

As with any other relationship it was abusive at times. Inappropriate phone calls to strangers, treks in the rain, scavenging for suitably plump butts whose contents we could empty into a skin to create new life. But any desperate, ordinarily shameful activities when shared always translate to comical ones.

But I did smoke alone too and I did really feel I needed cannabis.

When I was chronically ill, I believed it killed the pain and agitation and let me sleep.

Having ADHD, I’d discovered others swore a smoke allowed them to sit still, focus, when nothing else would. I’d have to agree.

If you have a mild antisocial streak, you tend to believe the density of stupid people in the world is increasing and you must retreat or suffer. Being stoned makes forced interactions so much easier.

This is when cannabis goes from being a good friend to a crutch taken for granted. When things aren’t going so well it becomes an obstacle to getting them back on track. After having used cannabis for a while to overcome obstacles, what’s the new remedy? I had to quit. Cannabis wasn’t to blame, it was the choice to put a damper on problems that required a lucid effort. I have to say eventually it became quite exciting to have regained the new altered state of consciousness that was sobriety.

That’s kind of a lie. I ran out of money. I started smoking cigarettes.

I wouldn’t take it back. There are people who would never have entered my life, events that would never have occurred, as with any other decision. It did also make me so much more aware of how antisocial I am. I also makes me wonder if that’s true. Or did indulging in exclusivist behavior with cannabis egging me on make me this way and I just didn’t notice. There’s no way of finding out really.