There's this story I like to tell, from back when I was a wee one fresh off my freshman year of high school. That summer, me and three other friends of mine would ride around town on our bicycles and smoke pot throughout the day at various public parts. A lot of the time we'd smoke in the restrooms at the park around the corner from my house. (One time, me and my buddy were standing in the one stall, locked in there, smoking a pipe, and a little kid came in: "What are you doing in there?" he asked loudly. "Going to the bathroom!" I responded. "BOTH OF YOU!??" the boy shouted shocked. We hurried out of there heads down past his mother.)

One day my three buddies called me and told me to meet them at the park, so I scurried on my bike around the corner and since they were lagging it a bit, I took the opportunity to smoke a little of my weed on my own. When they got there I was already blazed, and they immediately thrust a big fat joint into my hands. "We just rolled this, and we figured since you're such a homie you can go ahead and light it and take the first drag!" I was pretty shocked, since no one ever gave me greens on anything, but I went with it.

I lit it and took a pretty decent drag. They were all staring at me kind of funny. I blew it out. "It doesn't taste funny?" one asked.

"No, I think it tastes alright I guess," I answered. As I went to put it up to my lips again, the joint was slapped out of my hands.

"Dude!" They all started laughing. "That joint was full of grass, like lawn clippings, dude! You couldn't tell?!"

"No... but whatever." I didn't really care that much since I was already super high, but they were having a good laugh, but their reaction was more shock that I actually hit it without noticing it was grass, as if they didn't expect the joint to even get to the being lit phase, so they weren't really laughing at me so much. I enjoy telling the story because most people react with: Wow, what dickheads, making their friend smoke grass---and when you're a kid you believe that if you smoke grass it's like the worst possible thing for you to do.

But I was high, and when you're high as a kid it's so much more fun than it is when you're an adult. These days it's just a thing you do, and sure you get high but it's kind of just like another setting you can be on---a more pleasant, enjoyable setting, but it's nothing too dissimilar from what every day life is like. When you're a kid it's like a whole new fucking world. What you thought was stupid is now funny, what was ugly is pretty, what was benign is incredible. It's kind of like what being drunk is like as an adult. (And that's the fine line between being stoned and drunk, that people never understand, with pot you're never a different person, you're just a softer-edged version of who you really are. People seem to act like getting drunk is adult time to play pretend, and run away in that fantasy.)

So I was high and it didn't really matter that much to me, so I think it's a pretty funny story. I guess not many people are willing to tell a story in which they're the punchline, but really, it was a good gag. One time, though, I told this story, and someone got kind a little more upset at my buddies than I thought was warranted, and it was then that I realized the second side of the story isn't really something I should leave out.

They had their reasons. The truth comes out! When I was a kid even though I was spoiled in a lot of ways, I never got an allowance or felt like I could ever ask for money from my parents---even asking for a dollar would elicit a groan that made me wish I had never asked---sure they'd buy me stuff but money, no. As a stoner in high school, this made life difficult and usually weedless. As a result, I ended up smoking a lot of my friends pot---and when opportunities presented themselves sometimes stole it from people as well.

Every now and then I'd scrounge some money up, or some stolen pot, but in those moments I was fiercely possessive of it and didn't share it at all with anyone, usually not even telling people I had it so I wouldn't have to part with my precious. But you'll remember in the story, I got stoned in the bathroom with my own pot that day before they showed up, and purposefully too so that I wouldn't have to let on that I had pot to them. They rolled that grass joint mainly as a way to get back at me for never really smoking them out.

A month or so later, I was confronted by the 'leader' of the three guys I hung out with. I got told they didn't want to hang out with me anymore because I just smoked everyone's pot. I explained that I don't have money like they did---they all lived above the boulevard you see, and I was right below it---and it was nice they were understanding about it up til now but this sucks! There was no reasoning with them however, and I found myself friendless.

Wait, this didn't go the right way. By the end you were supposed to hate me instead of them. Oh well. I'm high, don't even know why I wrote this really. Whatever. I smoked a grass joint once for a little bit. It was pretty funny!