01 January 2018, 12:35am

In 1986, while I was nineteen, I got busted for possession at a Jimmy Buffett concert at The Aztec Bowl at San Diego State.

I was caught cold with two, small bags of weed on me. The cop inspected both, slipped the better into his left shirt-pocket, fastened the other to a clipboard and wrote me up for “one bag, shake marijuana, <1oz.” and sent me on my way. He told my buddy and me to coffee up and he went somewhere to smoke my good weed. 

On court day, I was offered a deal: plead guilty to a misdemeanor of minor in possession of alcohol and the cannabis charge would go away. I took it. Paid about a couple hundred bucks and that was that. 

At that time, I was editor-in-chief of The Sun, the weekly paper of Southwestern College. Paul and Willie were on staff. I knew both had done hard time for pot. 

When I told them I got off pretty easy, they looked at each other and Paul told me, “You have us to thank, then. We did your time.”

Willie nodded. He’d done seventeen years for the eight ounces he was caught with in the early 70s. His first offense. 

Paul did over twenty-five years for the half-ounce he had on him when he was busted. It was the late 50s, he was eighteen and, because his sixteen-year-old girlfriend was in the car with him, he got an extra felony for contributing to the delinquency and would spent the entire sixties, seventies and early eighties behind bars, over a few joints worth of pot.

The way they looked at it, anyone who ever went to jail for weed was pushing back against the system, putting Savio’s metaphor into action, until finally, the gears and wheels of the machine had been worn down enough that a guy didn’t get locked up for simple possession anymore. Maybe they had something. I told them I was grateful and I meant it. I still am.

But today, as of midnight, the cops can’t even ticket me for it any longer. No more having to fake glaucoma or irritability, either. Now that recreational use is no longer verboten, nobody can stop me from using it, even if it’s merely because I fucking feel like it!

I doubted I’d ever, actually, see the day. Under the Reagan eighties, this point in time seemed forever away. I wonder how Paul and Willie must feel. So, to celebrate and recognize a freshly-recognized right, I sparked my first, legal-for-no-reason-required big, giant bowl of indica at midnight. It was pretty much like any other. But still. It was cool. 

I’ll probably hit up the cannabis store this afternoon–I can imagine the celebration. I’ll fork over 12.5% more for the buds, from now on, but I swear I will not mind. I remember how hard it was to buy cannabis back then. Even basic, Mexican rag smuggled across in a tire–forget about something exotic or well-preserved–was often in short supply. It wasn’t unusual to go weeks on pipe resin. We’d resort to circling public parks and beaches, trying to discern who could be a dealer and then argue who’d get out of the car and make the approach.

One time in Skyline, I went up to a guy sitting on a picnic table with three other guys and asked, “any place around here to score some ganga?”

“Sure,” he said, “you want 9mm or magnums?”

He thought I asked for “guns.” 

This is better. Much so. 

–Michael Lane