Garden of Eve

I'm not sure how many joints we smoked on the way to Olympia Hempfest, but we got lost on the way there. There were plenty of parking spaces at the Heritage Park   Apartments   - but no people. Stupid GPS didn't know we were going to the 10th Anniversary of Olympia Hempfest at Heritage   Park , about a half mile up (or down?) the road. No worries. It was a beautiful day. We smoke another joint, turned off the annoying voice of technical direction and pressed onward, finally rolling up to our rock-star parking space right in front, ready to take on Washington State's first LEGAL Hempfest.  The first booth we stopped at was for I-584, a new voter referendum that would decriminalize home growing and sharing of our sweet cannabis. The guy running this booth, Jared Allaway, also does the "Marijuana is Safer than Alcohol" t-shirts. It makes my heart warm to see activism in progress - think global, act local, you modern-day hippies! I made new friends with d...

Sometimes the heat brings out the nastiest of little creatures – spider mites. It’s been over 80 degrees in Seattle this week, making my green garden warmer than normal. It seems no matter how many times I sulphur my basement, sterilize the equipment, bleach the garden floors, walls, buckets -- those little fuckers manage to find their way in. Prevention is always key – no people, pets or outside clothing should make contact with the garden gals. But shit happens, and so do bugs. You know you’ve been infested when little flecks of gold spots appear on the fan leaves. Mites suck the sweet underbelly leaf juice, gorging themselves to fuel their activity: laying millions, gazillion of tiny little mite eggs every three days. If in your garden inspections you find any kind of “web”, you should immediately remove and destroy the plant. I’ve heard of some people taking a high-pressure hose to the leaves, and then spraying with Neem Oil or Green Cure (a prepackaged powder mix avai...

One of the challenges of being a pot farmer is finding labor to help with trimming buds at harvest. You need a good pair of hands, and people who can keep their mouths shut. I had visions of blindfolding people before bringing them into my lair, but opted instead for retired old people who still want to serve a purpose. One such person is Helen, from Redneck, Wyoming, whom I met during a road trip in 2011. She had just finished chemo for breast cancer and was eager to smoke what I had brought into her RV Park that summer. I listened with great enthusiasm about her stories as a Playboy bunny in the 60s, as we sat smoking around her fire pit, her handsome cowboy boyfriend doting over her every need.  We became instant soul sisters and stayed in touch for over two years by phone and email. And then, one day she confided to me that her handsome cowboy boyfriend was caught receiving a blowjob from the neighbor down the street. The neighbor it turned out was a dude. I can only...

I don’t normally get high before going to church, but I had just come from a business meeting about weed, so naturally I smoked weed. I’m not a real religious person, but I attend services regularly because I get to see my pretty 22 year-old daughter. Since she moved away to an evangelical Christian college on the Eastside of Seattle, it’s pretty much the only time I can see her. So I go to church, and usually the two of us go to lunch after service. I meet her at our usual pew and I look in her eyes to see if she can see that I’m higher than the overhead teleprompters.  Somehow she always knows, but I pray she doesn't give me that disappointed look. Just then the entire congregation jumps to its feet, singing joyful, modern Christian rock songs to a real life boy band – complete with tight, skinny jeans and Justin Bieber hair styles. Sometimes I secretly lust after the lead singer, wondering how much he sins, although I’m pretty sure I’m the one that’ll be going ...

My babies, as photographed by Nathan Griffith  Mom shows up with the usual bag of groceries – coffee creamer, toilet paper and packaged lunch meat. What every single woman lives on.  I lead her into the kitchen where I set the bag down.  We settle into my small but adorable living room, sip flavored coffee and catch up on the latest family gossip. My cousin is unwed and knocked up, she says, with a gleen in her eye, thankful it isn’t one of  her  kids. Eventually she asks how my “event planning” job is progressing. Will they offer me a full-time job so I can get health insurance? She says women my age need breast exams and colonoscopies, and I agree. But they won’t be offering any health care because I don’t work for the event planning company. Never did. There was no easy way to say it, so I blurted it out, “Mom, I’ve been growing pot for a while, and I’m really happy. Cannabis saves lives, and I only work with the best dispensaries. I really don’t t...