When I was in high school a lot of my friends smoked weed, but I never would partake. I am allergic to cigarette smoke and at the time I thought I would also be allergic to weed smoke. I also had in my head all the lies and bullshit that the government and media told us about weed. I looked down upon my friends that smoked weed, because I thought they were stupid. I thought they were just walking through the “gateway” to drug addiction and going down the path to ruining their lives. Boy was I naïve!
It wasn’t until I moved to a different city that was almost two hours away and attend a new high school that I was introduced to weed on a much bigger level. People on my football team, classmates, and my closest friends smoked, but I still wasn’t into trying it out. I was and still am one of those kids that have hopes for their life and I saw weed as a hindrance to what I was trying to achieve. I thought I’d become the typical ignorant belief of what a “pot head” was and that I would become lazy and not achieve what I wanted to do. Ironically, I was already lazy. I became stressed senior year of high school because I found out I was a father of a beautiful baby girl, had to make the stressful decision of what I wanted to do with my life and what college was going to help me do that, and I almost didn’t graduate because I didn’t do so hot in school towards the end of my senior year. Long story short my Chemistry teacher was one of the teachers at graduation and after I got my diploma I saw him and he shook my hand and told me, “You’re welcome.” That is one thing I will never forget in my life and I have a huge amount of respect for that man. But anyways back on subject, after graduating I went off to college and everything was good for a while until about half way through the semester and that was when my stress level went up.
For the whole first semester of college I was constantly looking for work, not because I needed money but because I needed to provide for my daughter, which is known as court order child support. I have always sucked at finding jobs and I really don’t know why that is, but I was trying my hardest. Well, one day I received a piece of certified mail from the court telling me that I had to appear in court over my child support. My mom, who used to work for jobs and family services, basically knew what was going to happen and didn’t really want to take off of work to go with me, so I went by myself. First, I had a one on one with the attorney that was in charge of my case and was told basically what’s going to happen. I was told that I will be getting a warning because I was behind in my payments, but if I had to come back into court I could face 3-30 days in jail. For a guy who has a big problem with authority this was a big thing to me. I felt alone and that the world was against me. I went from being a guy who was an A and B student before he moved to a different school, to be a student that barely graduate, and now to someone who is almost facing jail time because he is unable to find a job. I felt like I was the scum of the earth now.
After that I went back to school with a whole different out look on life. I was a person doing something in life so that I could be something some day. So that I could be a better father, a better son, a better citizen, a better overall person and for doing this I was treated like a common criminal. Yeah I really needed to find a job so that I could pay child, but my daughter already had the income of her mother and her mother’s boyfriend, now fiancé. They had their own apartment, newer cars, and life going in the right direction. Meanwhile, I was still trying to figure life out and to develop as an adult. This wasn’t helping that development at all.
I went back to school mad at the world. I began to fall into the depression that before I barely noticed I had and used to be very manageable, but now it took over more and more. Soon, things started to go downhill. My grades began to slip, my relationship with a girl who was a big part of my life began to fall apart, I realized that the school I decided to go to wasn’t the right match for me, and for the first time I thought about suicide. Luckily for me, I always have believed that suicide does get rid of the pain you feel, but it pushes all that pain now onto the people who really care about you and I could never do that. I couldn’t imagine my mom, my grandma, my sister, and everyone else I love having to deal with all that pain. I couldn’t leave my daughter in this world growing up without really knowing her real father. I had to find a different route to get rid of or manage this pain and the stress of life.
Being a psych major I was really afraid of seeking therapy or getting prescribed an antidepressant, because then you are labeled as someone who has a mental illness and are easily put in that category of psycho’s, murders, and all these other people who do bad things that the media likes to slip in that they have depression or there were signs of depression in them. I didnt want this label ever attached to me and I didn’t want to depend on taking a pill each day. So I only knew of one other kind of “medication” that people used for depression and that was good ole’ Mary Jane.It was easily attainable too me. Many of the people around my campus smoked and I could have easily smoked for the first time with them, but I didn’t think it would be right to take that first inhale unless it was with my best friend, who is like my brother and a long time pot smoker.
My first time smoking wasn’t until Christmas break and like losing my virginity I remember it well. I met my friend at an apartment of an acquaintance of ours where they’d smoke and we’d just chill, play video games, and talk. Like many times before they asked me if I wanted to smoke and to their surprise I said, “yes.” I have been around them plenty of other times when they smoked, but this time was different. I was actually smoking. I never thought smoking would be that difficult, but I found it hard to do simple things such as inhaling and holding the blunt and I didn’t know that you had to be mind full of your lips touching it. After the first blunt I felt like weed was pointless and stupid, because I wasn’t feeling any effects of it. I slowly I began to realize that I was finding everything interesting and was zoning out thinking about and looking at things. I remember just sitting in that recliner, cracking a smile, and thinking to myself, “man I’m high!” What ensued that night was more smoking, some video gaming, and some great conversations. That night was a great night and it was the first of many great high moments to come.
Now, I don’t use weed as my crutch. I am not heavy smoker and I’d consider myself more of a social or recreational smoker. I only smoke when I am with friends or when I am dealing with a lot of stress or my depression. Weed has open a whole new outlook for me and I am glad I welcomed Mary into my life.
P.S. You can’t make a reference to Mary Jane without a video of Rick James performing Mary Jane live!
Mind Of A Free Thinker 