Intoxication, A Family Affair

What would be different with family holidays if weed were legal? There is no time where individuals want to be intoxicated more than when spending time with family. Well that's at least how my family goes and I’m sure I’m not alone. It is only 5:30 in the evening and we have already gone through a handle and half of vodka, a few bottles of wine, and about to dive into a couple of more bottles of wine, perhaps some bourbon and eggnog later. Personally, as the youngest drinker, I have been through plenty of bloody marys and now on my fifth or sixth glass of Stags Leap (one of my favorite vineyards!)  I already feel sluggish, sleepy, and in a more depressive state than before, but at least a portion of my social anxiety is removed and I am able to interact with everyone! Man but I wonder what would happen with all of us if we were allowed to intoxicate with cannabis rather than ethanol? 

How is it I can get sloshed and enjoy drunkenness together as a family but due to most drugs being illegal we aren’t able to enjoy the good drugs? No I doubt most people would want to shoot up heroin with their family, but how much fun would it be to enjoy your family with a few puffs of cannabis? I have been able to get so close to my friends that I have smoked with and participated in other drugs with; quite honestly I wish I was able to have some sort of ethereal experience like that with my family. 

Think of the typical fifteen or sixteen year old and how they would rather get a root canal than hangout with their parents. What if during a planned game night the parents arranged to smoke a few bowls with the teen? There might be a considerable moral and social discord to that, but I  imagine the teenager would actually enjoy themselves. Wouldn’t it be better if parents, responsible and experienced guardians, be the ones to fully introduce their children into a drug that they will experience in their lifetime. Most parents will want their children to first experience ethanol with them so the child will understand the effects of the drug before they are in a social environment, a potentially harmful one without understanding what the effects are.  Why isn’t it the same with marijuana? Even so, this “experience” phase isn’t nearly as important with cannabis as it is with ethanol. Ethanol is a toxic, destructive substance which in excess never results in anything good; while cannabis could actually be used for good to create strong and lasting relationships with stubborn teenagers who might otherwise never want to be with family. An anonymous writer on ganjarama.com said that “smoking with my mother was part of my teenage years, it brought us closer together, because there was nothing I needed to hide from her.”  The massive stone wall created between teenager and parent is able to be chipped away with THC.  I realize there is a need to have a solid separation between being a parent and being a friend, but in the difficult, emotional times of being a teenager there is no emotional allowance in the teenager for a dictatorship. 

I look forward to 25 or 30 some years from now and I have to personally deal with this issue. What can anyone imagine what US drug policy will be then? Regulation? Medical use in all states? Recreational use? Maybe there will be solid evidence of what marijuana actually is and its health risks/benefits. No matter what the case, I will continue to choose marijuana over alcohol, I will restrict its use from children unless allowed by their parents, and I will do so with little regard for US drug law.