The High Times of Youth

Marijuana joints were easy to come by when Frank Halperin was a teen, and he fondly recalls the high times of youth. This “From Our Readers” remembrance tells the tale.

I was sitting outside my hometown bar and grill eating my cheeseburger and watching people of all shapes and sizes going in and out of the cannabis dispensary next door.

The building used to be a Rite-Aid. So it went from being a drug store to being a drug store.

It seems everywhere you go now, you’re likely to encounter the skunky smell of those who’ve recently consumed their cannabis. For adults 21 and over, it’s now legal, and it’s out in the open, whether one likes it or not.

When I was growing up in the ’70s and ’80s, you not-so-secretly smoked marijuana – aka pot, weed, a joint, a “J,” a doobie, etc. – which is cannabis with higher THC levels, the ingredient that gets you high. Schools warned kids about the dangers of marijuana, but that didn’t matter – just like alcohol, everyone knew someone who could get it for you.

Back then, getting stoned was a rite of passage, like owning at least one Led Zeppelin album.

I wasn’t a pothead; as a teenager, I preferred beer and lots of it.

There was no way I could ignore it, however. Hanging out with my friends in the park or at a house party, grass was inevitably passed around, and toking up was the cool thing to do.

I didn’t like how it affected me: sometimes I’d get super giddy, other times I’d be ultra paranoid. Like Forrest Gump with his box of chocolates, I never knew what I was gonna get each time I got blazed up.

I can’t remember the first time I got high, but there’s one instance that I’ll never forget.

I was 18, and working at B. Dalton Booksellers in the Cherry Hill Mall. I had just finished work, and was sitting inside my assistant manager’s car. She pulled out a small bong, filled it with pot, took a hit, and passed it to me. I politely complied.

An hour or so later, I came home and went straight to the kitchen. I dumped a box of chicken nuggets on some aluminum foil and put them in the oven. I was so hungry, but I also felt happier than I’d felt in a long time; I was exhilarated.

Once the nuggets were done, I called my friend George. I was eating way too fast while laughing hysterically on the phone. I must’ve looked like a character straight out of “Reefer Madness.”

Then it happened.

I somehow inhaled a chicken nugget. It was lodged in my nose, and I couldn’t breathe.

I was panicked. Then, with all the wind that I had in me, I blew through my nose and the nugget flew across the room. Success.

Of course, I then went back to laughing and chomping on the nuggets as if nothing had happened.

I thought about that night as I was watching everyone walking out of the dispensary with their discreet little bag of happiness.

If cannabis is enhancing your life, I say all the power to you.

As for me, I’ll stick with my coffee and cigarettes.

Frank Halperin is a former newspaper reporter and freelance writer based in South Jersey. His work has appeared in “Spin,” “New Jersey Monthly,” “South Jersey Magazine,” and the Newark Star-Ledger.

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