Summer Camp

Last summer when I visited my hometown in Colorado, I had the strange and eventually easily overcome urge to go out and try to score some weed. Not because I wanted to smoke it, or otherwise ingest it. I just wanted the chance to stroll into the corner dope store and proudly announce that I was there to purchase some cannabis, thank you very much. It would be sweet retribution for all those weekends I spent wandering around, looking for somebody who knew somebody who could hook me and my friends up. The only dealing would be the search for clearance items.
And now I should point out that my own marijuana use was of the very limited variety. For a brief time, I lived with a guy who truly enjoyed his afternoon bake. It was part of a social order that I had no trouble falling into, since slamming back a six-pack was certainly in my list of things to do on any given Friday night, and once the cans were empty, they could rather abruptly be turned into rudimentary pipes. Not that I'm condoning such behavior, mind you. This was how I lived. I never owned a pipe or a bong.
My mother did. Not wittingly, of course. She received, as a gift, a curious piece of ceramic that looked to be a martian, with funnels for antennae on the top of his head. On one side, he wore a great bloodshot eyed expression of glee, while on the other those eyes were narrowed to slits and the goofy grin was replaced by a very small hole. About the size of a reasonably rolled joint. This was back in 1970's Boulder, Colorado, where such items could easily have been slipped onto the shelves at any gift store, and I'm sure that it came to her as an object d'art, not a piece de pot. It sat in my mother's window sill for years before the true nature of this little sculpture became hysterically apparent. I am quite confident that in all those years, it was never utilized for its intended purpose.
Now, with the legalization of marijuana in the Mile High State (disclaimer: it is forbidden to write more than a paragraph about pot in Colorado without using that phrase), it seems like a missed opportunity. But the good news is this: Over in Durango, the first cannabis-friendly ranch resort is opening in July. CannaCamp offers the expected outdoor adventures and water sports you might expect from your more traditional summer camp, but also has a number of "cannabis activities" on tap. Or on bud. Laying down in a meadow and staring at the clouds. That kind of thing. And I did check: There are arts and crafts. I can only hope that some enterprising guest takes it on themselves to spend a little times in the ceramics hut recreating their version of my mom's little alien visitor. If they want to get their bud badge, that is.