A stoner-life crisis
A writer contemplates getting back into weed as 30 approaches
I turned 28 recently, and naturally this milestone has caused me to look back at the series of professional missteps and romantic disasters left in my wake and wonder what brought me to this point. Many of my friends have already settled down and started families. What’s holding me up? The time has come to look myself in the mirror and finally ask a question that has grown inside like a festering tumor as it went ignored during most of my 20s.
How did I get this far in life without getting into weed?
As a thickly bearded, semi-employed, left-leaning writer, and fan of art and music almost exclusively made by people pulling tubes on the regular, I can’t help feeling that there’s a doobie-shaped void in my soul, a void I have for too long been filling with oxygen instead of the seriously sweet vapors of that sticky icky. I started off on the right foot, stealing shake from my friend's mom at the tender age of 13 and building a local reputation as a craftsman with my ability to turn everything from fresh produce to Buzz Lightyear action figures into makeshift pipes.
But my first high school party—which ended in a blur of bong rips, Boone’s Farm, and projectile vomit—ended up putting me on the “right” path, which in this instance might’ve actually been the wrong path. Long story short, I blamed weed for ruining my chances of making out with my smoking-hot crush Julie. I decided to opt for sex and rock ’n’ roll over drugs; if only I knew that Julie would be the first of many women to woo me with her charms only to leave me floating naked in a pool as I puked my guts out.
Like the ol’ saying goes, I'll try anything once, twice, and again and again until I no longer have the willpower to stop. So, I hopped on my bike and cruised to several Milwaukee headshops to see what's changed in the last 15 years—a weed state of the union if you will. And, you know, see if I might enjoy getting high again.
The first thing I noticed is that the passage of time has had virtually no impact on the average stoner's musical tastes. Based on my anthropological findings—basically just observations of T-shirts, wall hangings, and wind socks for sale at places like the aptly named Green Fields (1800 N. Farwell Ave., 414-224-7762) and Starship (1661 N. Farwell Ave., 414-227-0646)—dudes who smoke jammers still like Bob Marley, The Grateful Dead, and Pink Floyd. It seems only the generational consciousness of poetic Long Beach bong-rock act Sublime has merited elevation to this elite group since I checked out of Marijuanaville.
Smoking technology, on the other hand, is leaps and bounds ahead of where it was back then. Many local shops showcased a variety of vaporizers, a smoke-less smoking apparatus that looks like a silly straw strapped to a Theremin. Bongs and pipes have been turned into pricey, graduate-level art projects; twisting, hand-blown glass monstrosities emblazoned with throbbing mushrooms, futuristic sea turtles, and lots of other ridiculous bullshit. At a more no-nonsense establishment like Knuckleheads (2949 N. Oakland Ave., (414) 962-3052), digital scales with built-in calculators and clinically packaged drug-test masking agents had replaced the playful prosthetic penis Whizzinators of my youth.
A positive development in the headshop industry is the advancement of women. The glass-water-pipe ceiling has been cracked, and red-eyed female Phish fans have finally taken their rightful place alongside their unemployed male counterparts at the smoke-shop counters of Milwaukee. Pipe Dreams (2644 S. Kinnickinnic Ave., 414-489-7473) is an ideal first-date place for soulmate smokers. He’ll love the G.G. Allin shirts, she’ll adore the knock-off Snuggies, and they’ll come together in the sex-toys section.
After my swing through Milwaukee headshops, I went to my bedroom, laid down, and cranked Bob Marley’s “Redemption Song.” Then I got back up and turned off “Redemption Song.” Even after everything I had just seen, I still wasn’t cut out to be a pothead. Maybe I’m too old. Maybe I just can’t get into shitty music. Wherever you are, Julie, I hope you’re happy.
