Image via Flickr user Alex Weimer.
In my weeded out life, I try to focus on the lucky little bonuses the universe throws my way. Many of these joys are a direct result of my struggling memory—a forgotten gram found in a neglected pair of pants, a condom discovered in my room in the nick of time, the other half of that awesome sandwich from yesterday. It’s never anything mindblowing, really; just little occurrences that let you know the odds are in your favor. I try not to take these moments for granted, but I recently had a couple of stressful days and found myself thinking, I need a break! A break never came, but the stress reminded me of something that happened on a road trip with my brother, whom I call Bhai.
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Bhai and I have done a million road trips together, and I thoroughly enjoy having him as a travel companion, although he can be kind of a pain in the ass while he’s driving—he’s one of those people that insists that the shotgun rider’s main responsibility is to make things easier for the driver, and he can be a real Nazi about the music selection. Nevertheless, he is my brother and my number one chiefing buddy from way back in the day, so the rides are always a blazy adventure. On one particular trip, we were part of a family caravan on our way to my uncle’s wedding in Toronto. The grownups and kids were in a big SUV, and the in-betweeners, Bhai and I, were in a compact rental car leading the way.
When we left New York early that morning, we hit the highway in an orderly line with the family car behind us, so it was impossible to smoke without being detected. About an hour in, I slyly rolled a joint, and just at the right moment, Bhai zipped the little compact into the next lane—we lost ourselves in the other traffic for just enough time to smoke. Moments later, we repositioned ourselves in front of the unsuspecting fam. We repeated this exercise five or six more times on the long drive north, and we successfully hid our smoking from the family—although there were definitely several other cars not related to us that were visibly offended by the two rapidly blazing brown guys tearing up I-90 in a Geo Metro.
The plan was to drop the rental car off at Buffalo Airport, where we’d meet a cousin who would drive us both to our uncle’s place in Canada. The cousin was not down with weed, so I began panicking. Mind you, I wasn’t panicking because I was stoned retarded and about to be trapped in a car with a lame-wad Desi family member. I was panicking because there were at least two grams of haze left in the jar. We didn’t want to risk taking it over the border with us, but we didn’t have enough time to smoke it—and I most definitely was not going to let us throw it in the garbage. We sat in the rental lot and I twiddled the plastic Cartoon Network cube in my fingers. I hopped out, and as my brother went and returned the car, I walked into an empty parking spot and dropped the cube behind the cement bar. I read the space number aloud, “346,” cringed at what a waste this was, and walked back to the entrance where our cousin had already collected Bhai. As soon as I got in the back seat, I realized I had a pack of hemp papers in my pocket. Not wanting to have even the mildest contraband when crossing the border, I discretely tossed the pack out the car window before we exited the parking garage.
After that, we were in Toronto for several days doing the usual brown people wedding stuff: standing around awkwardly talking to relatives that we weren’t sure we were related to, sustaining painful chit-chat with people we were related to and wished we weren’t, and trying not to check out any girls because we might be related to them. We managed to sneak in a few beers and a game of pool that week, but other than that it was pretty boring. That boredom extended all the way to the drive back to Buffalo with the same cousin. Neither Bhai nor I had blazed in many days, and we were about to hop on a flight from Buffalo back to New York. The worst part was that we had about four hours to kill before the flight, because my cousin wanted to get back to his shitty life in Buffalo mad early in the morning.
He dropped us off at the terminal; we waited until he had pulled away to light cigarettes. I pulled the printout of our reservation from my pocket to double check the flight time and noticed the flight number. I read it out loud to Bhai: “Delta 346 to New York.” He looked at me blankly. “Do you think that Cartoon Network cube is still sitting where I left it?” I wondered out loud.
“No fucking way,” said Bhai with a tone that was both skeptical and hopeful. Without another word, we walked into the terminal and followed the signs to the rental car lot. I told the attendant we had lost some keys a little over a week earlier and asked if we could take a look where we had left the car. He ineptly waved us in, and we trekked up to the third floor and counted our way to space 346.
There was a car parked in 346, and its front bumper was edged over the cement bar. I reached under it to feel around and could not believe my senses when my fingers gripped a plastic cube. The weed was still there! I pulled it out and waved it at Bhai, whose eyes went wide with excitement. We rejoiced for a moment before getting serious about the next steps of the process.
The weed had sat out there for many humid mornings, so it was a little damp but still smelled potent as hell. A little tobacco would help it burn just fine. But we lacked papers and a secure place to smoke. Bhai proposed emptying out a cigarette and stuffing it with the weed—the added benefit of camouflage would allow us to smoke it anywhere out of noseshot. On the other hand, I was feeling lucky. I led us back to the entrance of the lot. Just after I waved a thank you to the attendant, I gave the entire entranceway a hard scan. My eyes stopped at a little white rectangle—sure enough, the pack of hemp papers was sitting at the base of the gate. I snatched them up, and we hurried off.
I handed everything to Bhai. He went into the bathroom and rolled our little bonus into a smooth, cigarette-like spliff. We triumphantly chiefed that bad boy at the far end of the pavement outside the terminal. Having not smoked in days, we got extra ripped, and the rest of the excursion was all the more bearable for it. It is definitively one of the best things that has ever happened to me.
For this and all the other wins I experience, I thank the universe. I wish you, dear reader, the same fortune in all things weed.
Previously – The Panickers
