Dear Uncle Mike,
I’d be interested to read what
kind o f counsel you’d give to an
intelligent young person regarding
the decision to use drugs and
alcohol, or not. I may be in a
position to do just that one o f these
days, and so I find myself thinking
about it.
A
finely selected
w om en’s (Melottuun
6
‘
I’ve had some experience with alcoholism, agree with the view that it is a disease,
and tend to look at drugs the same way. For that reason, 1 see the decision as more o f a
health issue than a moral one. However, I also know that kids with a family history o f
alcoholism are at much greater risk. Especially for them, but also for anyone in their
teens, the alcoholic progression doesn’t take years, but just months. Which can lend
more urgency to the discussion than might other wise be helpful.
O f course, the law is clear on drug use and under-age drinking, but kids start
making decisions before they come o f age, so it makes no sense to me to postpone the
discussion. Just because they’re not o f age doesn’t mean they aren’t making adult
decisions. And “just saying no” to a teenager is often either provocative or
unenforceable. So. What to say? And how?
Another Uncle
w o rk h j r d
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Dear Uncle Someone,
Before he begins, allow Uncle Mike to refer you to any o f the thousands o f
tiresome books published on the subject, none o f which Uncle Mike would read on a bet.
Aside from sex with underage nuns, few topics arouse the gentle public’s murderous
wrath quite like drugs Or, more accurately, DRUGS! While Uncle Mike is as fearless
as the next person, he’s not an idiot and so goes leagues out o f his way to avoid talking
about DRUGS! with anyone he hasn’t known for at least twenty-five years. Today, he
feels like playing the idiot.
First, Uncle Mike views with great suspicion the notion o f ‘controlled
substances’. By whom and to what end? If the controlling body is a government
consisting in large part o f hypocritical, bible thumping, birkenstock wearing, gin swilling
sleaze bags and toaidies who’d sell their families for a whiff o f what they mistakenly
imagine to be power, logical inconsistencies are bound to arise. Uncle Mike suspects we
all have a right to put whatever we want into our bodies. Unfortunately, many o f us are
stupid about it. Uncle Mike has heard two enlightened pronouncements on the subject.
“We don’t have a drug problem or a crime problem, we have a child abuse problem.”
And, “The drug problem consists o f the wrong people taking the wrong drugs.” Federal
policy based on these two assumptions might savage the bond rating o f the drug cartels
and make possible the cultivation o f hemp and, consequently, stop the rape and pillage of
rainforests to make cheap siding, newsprint and toilet paper. But we digress.
Every drug has different characteristics, every dabbler in brain chemistry has a
drug o f choice. For those longing to be witty and clever and much too awake, there’s
cocaine. For those who are convinced there’s more to reality than meets the eye, there
are the hallucinogens: mushrooms, peyote and whatever passes for LSD these days. For
those looking to round off the edges and read between the lines, there’s marijuana and,
whenever possible, hashish. For those with a love for blurring distinctions, there's
alcohol. For those yearning to be master o f the universe while robbing someone at
gunpoint to get more, there’s crack. For those who just want it all to go away, there’s
heroin; which is, to opium, what fortified wine is to a pleasing pinot gris. But we digress
again.
What young people should know about all drugs is that they alter consciousness;
this is, o f course, why people use them. Before a person deliberately bends their mind,
they should have a mind to bend. Had Uncle Mike ever taken DRUGS!, he would not
have begun before reaching young manhood; which is to say, old enough to have some
notion o f reality and a psychological framework strong enough to hang unsettling
experiences on. If Uncle Mike were giving counsel to a young person, he would
encourage them to research the subject by talking with people o f experience, not merely
his or her peers. He would encourage them to vow never to put anything in a vein or to
drink and drive. He would advise them to put down any substance, controlled or
otherwise, that interferes with their work or personal relationships. He would encourage
them to raise children who laugh more than they cry and who are able to dream without
W ATSU
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F or A l l V our R eal E state N eeds
m R LIFT EDGE FEBRUARY 2.004
5