The Age of Weed for Agers

In a long-ago Woody Allen schtik, Woody described how people were getting expensive cars across the border without paying customs fees. They purchased lower-priced luxury cars in Mexico, disassembled the cars, then reassembled them when they came into the US. Inspired by this, Woody said he decided to give it a try. He disassembled his newly-purchased luxury car and attempted to reassemble it after crossing the border. Unfortunately, the result was that he ended up creating a washer/dryer, instead of a car.

At the time, LBL laughed herself sick at the mental image. But now, our world is doing exactly that with reality. We take truth and turn it into pull taffy, manipulate it at will, resulting in actual real events turning into something else entirely.

Our duly-elected president is a master at this. While people are being massacred, he bleats that he has single-handedly created peace. While children are caged, he takes credit for saving them. World events are seen only through his eyes and then spewed up in entirely different form into cyberspace and into our living rooms. He turns bigots into buddies and despots into dream relationships. There is nothing he can’t do. Everyone says so.

When reality becomes this malleable, there is psychological fallout. Many become fearful, others enraged. Therapists have been innundated with people who no longer trust the world they live in. Both depression and activism have been growing by leaps and bounds.

But another group of people is taking another path. And Boomers are the vanguard of this new activity. As one 65-year-old put it, “I smoked pot a couple times in college, but never felt the promised buzz…Now I turn to pot and CBD products to feel better. Instead of popping Xanax when I spiral with anxiety, I squeeze a drop of THC tincture under my tongue…And rather than swallowing Ambien to crash into an eight hour coma, I nibble a corner of a weed gummy and drift sweetly into sleep.”

LBL can hear some Loyal Readers shreiking with disgust right now. She will not engage. She is here, not to make a case for or against pot, but rather to honor Sgt Joe Friday’s request to “Just state the facts, Ma’am.” LBL will duly comply.

And, here, thanks to the current issue of Arlington Magazine, are the facts: “Studies show that seniors are the fastest-growing consumer segment for cannabinoids, both the high-inducing and the anxiety and pain-lessening kinds. The 2016 National Survey on Drug Use and Health reported that the ranks of cannabis users over age 65 have increased 10-fold compared with the same study in previous years.”

Why seniors, one might ask? History, for one reason. Seniors lived through the 60s and 70s, when marijuana use went mainstream. For them, it’s a known commodity. And, as states join the growing ranks of legalization of marijuana, seniors can partake without doing anything illegal. Even in jurisdictions in which cannabis is technically still illegal, the repurcussions of such use are going steadily down. CBD is sold in safe places that seniors frequent, like chain drugstores and Bed, Bath, & Beyond. One can now purchase electronic blinking Santas, greeting cards, Depends, and something to get high with at the same place.

Does maijuana pose risks? Absolutely. There are drug interactions, possible side effects, and the problem of deregulation. Is marijuana safe? That depends on who you ask. Can marijuana really help with depression, anxiety, insomnia, and physical discomfort? You bet, say countless thousands of users.

Keith Stroup, a senior and the founder of NORML (The National organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws), put it this way, “(I) just did not want to leave the impression that older smokers are only smoking for medical purposes. Marijuana makes life generally more vivid and alive. Food tastes better, music sounds better. Sex seems more satisfying. Retirees often have time on their hands and fill it with walking the dog, weeding the garden or pounding a golf course. These mundane activities are far more enjoyable when one is high.”

LBL doesn’t know how any of this can deal with the actual cause of most of the anxiety that people are now experiencing. Perhaps we can convince That Cause to smoke some weed himself. Maybe he will then calm down about the fact that Daddy was largely disappointed with him, Mommy was largely emotionally absent, he didn’t have much intellectual or leadership ability, and a lot of people around him are secretly making fun of him behind his back. Then he might give the rest of us a needed break.