It was a set-up. I had just been laid off from my job as a sales rep for a pen company. And while that pen company was the best sugar daddy anyone could ask for, it did a drug test anytime one of its employees got in a car accident. So I purposefully avoided inhaling any marijuana into my precious virgin lungs the whole time I was there. But once I got canned from my cushy pen-sales job, all bets were off. I packed up my Boston apartment and moved to a place in Park Slope, Brooklyn, that I found on Craigslist. I even joined the food co-op there—which sounds spectacular in theory, but in practice was far from it. The other members would ream you out: “If you’re late for your shift one more time, Esther, we’re going to put your membership on probation.” Hey lady, save your spleen for when your artificial-insemination-produced teenagers cuss you out, all right?
Within my first month in New York, I started smoking weed thanks to a childhood friend of mine. I figured, “I went to kindergarten with Paul, I know this guy, so how bad can marijuana be?” And it wasn’t bad at all—except maybe for poor Paul. I got high in his Bed-Stuy apartment, and I could not have been more annoying: “Whoa. I can’t believe I never got high before!” Then, a few days later: “This is awesome! I took a shower yesterday and washed my hair, and because I was baked, I couldn’t remember if I shampooed or not, so I washed my hair again. Weed is sooo amazing!”
And so began my journey of getting high … even as my credit score was getting low. I needed to figure something out. One of my roommates was a gangster Korean girl from Guam with hoop earrings, a curvaceous body and a black boyfriend. One day he mentioned that he knew a weed dealer in our neighborhood. No fucking way … that was exactly what I needed! So I walked around the corner to Fourth Avenue and went up one flight of stairs to the weed dealer’s den. He had long hair, kept smiling at me, and knew everything about weed. I was mesmerized. “He is so cool—he lives off the grid and risks his life providing marijuana for the community. I am in awe,” my stupid little brain thought.
I love weed, he sells weed, and therefore I love him was basically my logic. So before too long, I was reveling in all the behind-the-scenes glory of a weed dealer’s life. I went with him to pick up, I got to see all the different kinds of people who came to buy, and I even made a few deliveries myself—once to an education professional. “You’re a teacher, and you smoke weed? Whoa!” For some reason, that blew my mind, and it also fast-forwarded my career as a professional stoner. I had to catch up quick, since it seemed like everybody else—even the schoolteachers—had gotten a head start in life as lovers of weed.
One night, my boyfriend and I were woken up by the sound of sirens blaring and people shouting. We looked out the window, and holy shit—the building next door was on fire! We grabbed two large blue Rubbermaid roughneck totes full of weed and calmly carried them down the stairs and around the corner to my apartment—passing two fire trucks and a dozen policemen along the way. Phew … that was close. I don’t know what started the fire, but if it had been just a few feet closer, we would’ve gotten all of Park Slope high. Too bad. If we had, maybe—just maybe—my pissy co-workers at the food co-op would have actually started to smile.
A year and a half of adventures later, my awesomely cool weed-dealer boyfriend somehow got me evicted from my apartment. Suddenly, I was back at square one—except this time in Queens. But I refused to fall for the next weed dealer I met. Hell, no! These days, the next mistake I date will at least have to know where all the cool skateboarding parks are.
