Cannabis Culture; Reelin’ in the Years

“Are you reelin’ in the years, stowin’ away the time? Are you gatherin’ up the tears? Have you had enough of mine?” – Steely Dan

In Vermont and across the Nation there is an accelerating, green culture shift underway. With the July 1, 2018 legalization of recreational cannabis, the days of reefer madness are slinking away like a bad dog. The forces of opposition still turn back occasionally to bare teeth and growl, but they remain somewhat defeated nonetheless. It’s true the Green Mountain State’s legislators have only passed the first half of what’s needed, with a tax-and-regulate system still in the works. We’ll see how they handle the state’s myriad of small indie growers that have had a robust, self-regulated farm-to-table market in place under the table for several decades.

For the most part, Vermont growers are a very ethical lot. Today, I heard a new term intended to go beyond organic: veganic, or vegan-organic. Growers that advocate for veganics cultivate the soil as a living, bio dynamic environment, full of various bacteria and fungi that provide 100% nutrient bio-availability rather than applying nutrient supplements derived from animal bi-products.

Now it’s becoming safe for you admit that you enjoy smoking or ingesting marijuana, cannabis, weed, or whatever you call it. Much like being gay a decade ago, everyone in Vermont is now legally permitted to come out of the closet. But are they?

I was at an event planning session with an older friend who I have smoked with and I asked him if there would be any cannabis served along with all of the drinks and refreshments at his party? Since it would be taking place at his home, I assumed he would offer some alternatives. He was quite surprised at my question and seemed a little anxious to even consider the possibility. His first thoughts — that some of his guests might become uncomfortable with the presence of a budtender — dominated. While the laws have changed, in many cases the social norms remain unscathed.

If not now, when?

If and whenever cannabis smoking reclaims it’s lost honor, we may be provided with a valuable social lubricant, one that hopefully eases us into greater intellectual, creative and spiritual dialogue. That may only happen when we begin to envision getting high as actually having a higher purpose, something more than stoned. However, there is a learning curve. Some people do just get totally wasted, like Maureen Dowd. Her 2014 essay on the first time she tried cannabis with an edible candy bar is epic.

Perhaps, instead of Cheech & Chong, we need to spotlight some other cannabis-loving free-thinkers like Carl Sagan, Steve Jobs and Sarah Silverman. Otherwise, we remain mired in this foot-in-a-bucket situation. The problem is that most cannabis heroes are typically members of the rockin’ rebel alliance, with the exception of certain athletes like Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Conor McGregor, and Mark Phelps.

Sagan speaks…

When astronomer Carl Sagan was 35 years old, he wrote a famous essay for a book published in 1971 by Harvard Medical School Psychiatrist Dr. Lester Grinspoon researching the medical, social, and legal aspects of cannabis use in Marihuana Reconsidered. It wasn’t until almost thirty years later in 1999, and three years after Sagan’s death, that biographer Keay Davidson revealed Sagan was a lifelong cannabis user. In Carl Sagan: A Life, we learn that it was Sagan behind the pseudonym “Mr. X” professing his personal beliefs on the benefits of smoking the herb.

“When I’m high I can penetrate into the past, recall childhood memories, friends, relatives, playthings, streets, smells, sounds, and tastes from a vanished era. I can reconstruct the actual occurrences in childhood events only half understood at the time. Many, but not all my cannabis trips, have somewhere in them a symbolism significant to me which I won’t attempt to describe here, a kind of mandala embossed on the high. Free-associating to this mandala, both visually and as plays on words, has produced a very rich array of insights.”

High History: 500 Covers of High Times Magazine