Do you smoke pot?
You don’t have to answer that, but it seems that half the people I know do fairly regularly. I am not judging anyone. I smoked pot for years when I was young but got bored with it like I do with most things. Nor am I prudish about such things. When the weather is nice I will often sit outside with three fingers of bourbon and a good cigar. (Where do you think I write a lot of these things?)
The landscape has changed since I was a bored dropout in the lower-class suburbs of Philadelphia. In the 1970s pot was mostly for us, the hippies and the musicians; now it is everywhere. Marijuana is basically legal in all but a dozen states, and the laws against it have not really been enforced in years. Should we care? I do not really have strong feelings either way. The only drug-related issue that stirs me is the opioid slaughter. I would rather all my friends smoke pot every day than ever touch prescription pain pills, or anything laced with fentanyl. I have seen too many lives destroyed by “legal” drugs. I want to hate the pharmaceutical companies, but I am not allowed to hate people. Although they have done much good to alleviate suffering, those who profit from pills should never be trusted.
Medical marijuana always seemed like a no-brainer to me. It clearly alleviates suffering for cancer patients and others by curing nausea and providing overall comfort. Denying this aid to such people would be a lack of compassion. But obtaining a medical “prescription” has become so easy that requiring it has become a joke. The federal government still classifies marijuana as a class one narcotic, same as heroin; that’s ludicrous, you cannot OD on pot as far as I know. But is it a good thing for us to consume as a recreational pastime? I am left wondering and, again, I am not judging. There are companies making millions of dollars providing “comfort” to tens of millions of Americans. Should we really be trusting them any more than our standard pharmaceutical drug pushers?
But I am not that interested in public policy per se. I am just wondering why so many of us are spending so much of our lives buzzed. I spent much of my youth in my friends’ bedrooms with bongs and black-light posters listening to Led Zeppelin, trying to feel nothing. Was that a good thing? When my kids asked me about smoking pot I told them the truth. I didn’t do it because it made me feel good, but because it made me feel nothing. In the words of Pink Floyd I had become “comfortably numb”. When they pressed me on what the difference is between alcohol and pot, I told them I could drink a beer without getting drunk, but I could never smoke a joint without getting stoned. When they thought I was just preaching at them I told them to try pot themselves and they would see I was right. (I have never been father of the year material. Ha.)
From what I remember pot pulls me into myself; it causes me to disengage not only from others, but from life itself. That is the last thing my personality needs. I get why many of us would desire to be somewhat anesthetized most days. We live in an age when the four horsemen of the apocalypse always seem to be galloping across all our screens every day. Sometimes I want to hide in a cloud too.
It all has me wondering: why are we here? To be as relaxed as possible, and be kept as comfortable as possible until we die? To avoid suffering and stress at all costs? To maintain a low-level euphoria in the face of dreadful uncertainties? the pursuit of happiness? the American dream? Instead of wondering if it is legal or right, I should ask myself why I am reaching for numbness. Is pot going to clarify reality for me, or distort it?
I wonder how many psalms would have been written if David had been stoned all the time. He wrote often about his struggles with God and man, and with life. Also many beautiful words about the blessing of existence in our spiritual world. The Hebrew poets felt the same things we do, only more so. Life, reality, loss, pain, confusion, stress, heartache, joy, hate, love, bewilderment; it is all meant to be felt. To be stared at and embraced, with a clear head.
You may wave it off and decide to become the next Bob Marley or Snoop Dogg, I do not judge or blame you. They both became rich and famous while being stoned all the time, so what do I know? We should all work to alleviate the suffering of others, but I will not buy into the lie that the avoidance of suffering is the great priority of our short time here. That bar is too low.
“I smoke to get high, because the world is so low.” -Kid Cudi
“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. not as the world gives do I give to you. let not your hearts be troubled…” – Jesus