4:20

Well, it’s 4:20 again. Actually, I didn’t even realize it until I was walking home from The Bay and noticed the distinct aroma of weed in the air. Not thinking anything of it, I turned onto Memorial Boulevard and then it hit me: oh yeah, today’s 4:20! I should probably qualify that last statement by noting that I needed the help of the gaggle of people gathered at the legislative grounds, and the small army of hot dog vendors scattered around the area. Anyway, I put two and two together and decided to take a walk through the crowd of happy stoners and get myself a hotdog. It was a good hotdog, and I enjoyed it, but as I was walking and doing some people watching, I got to thinking about this wonderful, though completely stupid holiday.

4:20 has always been a special sort of day for me, which probably comes as no surprise to anyone who knows me. For years, it was a ritual of sorts to get together with a dank quarter and some good friends and smoke ourselves stupid until we passed out. Of course, there were usually many ‘adventures’ throughout the night: trips to 7-11/Macs, trips to other people’s houses to smoke more, maybe a game of ‘let’s get lost’ (a game where you drive to a neighborhood and see if you can get yourself lost. But this is whole separate post….), trips to Taco Bell, and maybe a beer run, but the general point of the day was always clearly in focus for the first half hour. Though the one thing I never did was go to the legislative building. I never understood it. I think there’s some sort of political ‘legalize it’ thrust to it, but I was always skeptical about that. After all, to the average dope smoker, there is a sort of bent appeal to the idea of getting out of your head right in front of the police and not getting arrested for it. Throw in the fact that you’re doing it on the doorstep of the provincial government, and you have yourself a nice little “fuck the Man” statement. This is all well and good, but as a political statement, it’s pretty pointless. Is the point to show how well behaved weed smokers are? A show of numbers? I don’t know. But as a social event, it’s a hell of a thing. For some reason that I’ll never fully understand, pot brings people together in a way like few other things can. There were all sorts of different kinds of people lounging around and smoking bowls, and being generally into the whole thing. It was nice to see.

4:20 as a holiday though, is pretty dumb when you really get to thinking about it. It’s a day to celebrate something that most of the people there already celebrated on a daily basis. I guess it’s nice to have a day to get wrecked, but why couldn’t you just pick Saturday? All it takes is a little bit of schedule co-ordination and, voila, 4:20 anytime! While you can’t go to the legislative grounds and get baked with a thousand other people, you can go to a park and just get stoned with your friends. Not a bad trade off. This is a realization that I came to when I was in Amsterdam on 4:20 a few years ago. I was all excited, but I was pretty much the only one. There was nothing different on 4:20 as there had been on 4:17. That didn’t stop me from paying my proper observance in my own ‘proper’ sort of way, but ever since then I haven’t really cared as much. I still make a point of smoking a nice spliff, but the day just isn’t the same grand thing it used to be. I think my general lifestyle might have something to do with this, although maybe it just means I’m getting old.

8.9/10

John E. Ryall.