Cigs or Weed

My Grandmother, although she didn’t smoke cigarettes, had small glass holders for cigarettes in her living room. Her apartment was fancy, and in the ’70s, smoking a cig at someone’s home during a dinner party was the norm.

In 7th grade, I nabbed one of those cigarettes out of curiosity. I palmed a few and brought them home. I wanted to try one, which I shared with my mom. I remember sitting on her bed, lighting one up, and she said to me, “Now inhale,” and I coughed my head off. The lesson was noted: don’t smoke cigarettes.

I smoked cigarettes off and on through high school, college, and early adult life, but I was lucky to have a random gene where I never became addicted. I could smoke a few a week and then just put the pack down. When I lived in London during my junior year abroad, I smoked plenty, but once I got on the plane to come home, I decided to stop, and that was that.

I started getting stoned in eighth grade, and from the first time, I never understood why it was illegal. Compared to watching my peers tap into their parents’ alcohol on the weekends, finding them wasted or ill, cannabis was a walk in the park. It took the edge off in a good way.

Alcohol and cannabis are probably the top vices. Ends up, I was on to something. Twenty-six percent of Americans aged 18-34 say they prefer cannabis vs. five percent for cigarettes, which is considerable. Over half of Americans used cannabis in the past year, making alcohol numbers go down. It is not shocking that tobacco and alcohol companies are trying to jump into the cannabis space and are spending plenty on lobbying.

All of this added up makes us wonder, what is the Federal Government waiting for exactly?