High

When we were newly married and living in a small college town, Mark and I did our share of smoking illegal crops. I had more access to it after getting to know several car dealers (who took a wide assortment of drugs) that called their loan applications into the bank where I was working. It wasn’t hard for me to get it from one of them and since Mark was a grad student and had more at stake than me I became the designated buyer. Through those years I avoided arrest, stopped when we were trying to get pregnant, and thereafter went on a long hiatus.

What could get you thrown in jail for a night is no longer the case as more and more states have legalized marijuana. I didn’t know much about how that worked until we went to my nephew’s wedding in Colorado which was the first state to lead the charge. Management somehow kept the lobby fresh and smelling legit but the minute you stepped out of the elevator on any floor the essence of the Devil’s Lettuce could knock you out. Signs posted throughout forbid the smoking of it in rooms which was universally ignored.

The state I live in has not legalized marijuana but just over the state line is a different story. It has been three years since they made it legal and overnight it seemed that cannabis shops popped up everywhere. The local tv stations reported on it like it was the grand opening of a Disney resort right here in the Midwest, and for a solid week an assortment of old, gimpy hippies were happy to be on camera to tout the benefits of it.

Shortly thereafter I went to a happy hour with my coworkers at an upscale new restaurant in town. A large sign posted near the entrance stated their dress code – no ball caps, no offensive sayings on tshirts, no flip flops, and no excessive odors. Turns out they very much saw what was coming and didn’t want their fine dining establishment reeking of weed.

Nearby is a shopping center that I frequent often with a Trader Joe’s, Homegoods, Target, and a wide assortment of other shops. Retail suburbia at its finest and a designated rest area for those who just visited the weed shop and test drove their buy in the car before hopping out to get some Two Buck Chuck. You could get high tailing these people with your cart and I have never cared about any of that until now because GOOD LORD it’s everywhere. Why are these people smoking dope in the middle of a Wednesday afternoon? Don’t they have jobs, kids to pick up from school, taxes to file? Shouldn’t getting high be reserved for Friday night like respectable potheads did back in the day?

I was doing my regular run to TJ Maxx because, yippe-ki-aye, there’s something new there every day. I was flipping through the racks and minding my own maxxinista business, focused on my hunt for something to wear to January. Two younger women came in, and like the smokey skies from a Canadian wildfire, we seasonally depressed shoppers were enveloped in the smell of Mary Jane. I stopped mid Nicole Miller jeans with the patented booty lift and tummy control and looked up. There they were loudly laughing in The Sacred Heart of Consumerism Cathedral. I tsk tsked and wanted to say, “Girls, girls, girls. Do you see what is happening here? Do you see this assortment of middle-aged women who appear to be worn out by everything? We’re here being respectable adults buying shit we do not need which is The American Way and now we’re going home smelling like we’ve been in Joey’s basement all night smoking pot while his mom upstairs doesn’t suspect a thing because she’s polishing off a bottle of wine. We can’t afford this! Are you paying any attention to what’s happening outside these doors? These times require us to be on high alert, not high high alert.”

The girls partied their way through the Maxx but didn’t last long. You’ve got be in the zone for shopping there and they got a bad case of the giggles in the underwear section when they held up massive pairs of briefs that would easily fit most of the rest of us pushing our cartloads of crap. I watched them as they and their smelly cloud wafted out the door and let out a sigh. Was it relief from the intrusion? Or was it envy for my younger years that were so long ago it often feels like I dreamt the whole thing?