I'd like to start by saying Congratulations to Drugs for winning the war on drugs. There's a famous PSA from the 80's (you can see it here) where a kid is rocking out in his room and his old man comes in and kills the stereo. He presents a box of weed or heroin or coke or Marcellus Wallace's soul to the kid (it's hard to tell what it is, they didn't have high-definition television back then) and claims that the mother found it in his closet. The father asks who taught him how to snort weed and the kid claps back "I learned it by watching you!" And the annoucerman says "Parents that use drugs, have children that use drugs." Implying that if you don't want your kids to be burnout losers, don't be a burnout loser yourself.
It never sat well with me. I don't know why. I never wanted to do drugs but not because PSAs, or McGruff the crime dog, or the President's wife told me not to. I just didn't need it. I was pretty happy as a kid. I didn't have a priest touch my twig or even my berries. I didn't get touched by an uncle. My teachers weren't mean to me. (Except Sister Angelene, my first-grade teacher, she was a See You Next Tuesday. But she also chose me to be in the barrel for the all-school parade or whatever it was, so I don't know what her major malfunction was.) So yeah, I didn't need an escape and I didn't need drugs. I never really saw the appeal. (Now, however, I get it. You can find me at the dispensary every now and again buying a bag of edibles.)
My parents never did drugs (that I know about anyway). I never really aspired to be much like my parents. (Except for a very short time when I said publicly that I wanted to be a hairdresser like my dad. I got over that quickly.) For the most part their lives didn't really interest me. Like the Dawson said in that movie "I DON'T WANT YOUR LIFE!" I was gonna grow up to be cool and be in a rock band or something. And I certainly wasn't going to live in Wisconsin. I got that 50% correct I guess.
My dad did bang a lot chicks in his day and that's the one thing I did kind of follow in his footsteps on... He was a master cocksman and if he were alive today he'd have some stories to tell that would make a pornstar blush. I'm sad that we only touched the surface of some of those before he died.
Anyway I do have a point here... We have some friends who have a kid in college and it's his birthday soon. It's a big one. The big two-one. So I've been thinking about him a lot lately. I'm not the parent of older kids but I put myself in his old man's place a lot because I want this kid to succeed as if he were my own son. They're pretty unlikely to read this but it's really nothing I wouldn't say to their face anyway. His parents are extremely hard on him. I hate the way they treat him sometimes. He's not my kid so I don't get in the middle of it. But I don't think he deserves the treatment they give him. I want to just take this kid to lunch and be like "Look man. This is not how it is. Your parents are assholes to you and you don't deserve it." You never know, it could happen...
I see a lot of me in him. He's got ADHD, he asks a lot of questions, and he's genuinely curious about things. I feel like his parents expect him to know the answers to the questions he's asking. They seem annoyed that he's asking. I don't think they understand how his brain works. But dammit I get it. I just don't want them to beat him down and beat him down until he becomes quiet, and stops asking questions altogether. So happy birthday Lucy. If you ever have questions, please don't hesitate to ask me, I'm happy to have an answer for you. I look forward to sharing a beer with you soon.