RECOVERING ADDICTS' PERSPECTIVE ON MARIJUANA IS FAR FROM HAZY

At first, she was just goofin,' slouched in her chair and acting as if she
didn't really want or need to be there. Too cool for the room.

Others had spoken, had talked about their marijuana addiction, but
18-year-old Darlene [in keeping with the spirit of anonymity at the
meeting, I'm using different first names for participants] didn't look like
one to open up. She was at this meeting of Marijuana Anonymous as part of a
court referral and looked for all the world like the most bored student who
ever sat in a world history class.

Toward the end of the hourlong meeting, during a slightly awkward few
moments of silence, she sensed people looking at her. "What do you say."
she said, meaning she didn't know what was expected. "Like, how it's been."
You don't have to talk if you don't want to, someone else said.

She began. "It took me six times, in and out of jail," she said. "I
[messed] up a lot."

She went on to say she'd stolen up to $300 from her mother on occasion,
mostly to get high. She used speed and alcohol, but as for the others in
MA, marijuana is the drug of choice.

Darlene thinks she's turned it around. She's graduated from high school, is
about to complete her court-appointed time in a group home and believes
she'll reconcile with the father of her baby.

By the time she had finished her few minutes of talking, she wasn't
laughing anymore. "I didn't like my life, but it wasn't drugs that [messed]
up my life. I did it. It was my choice."

Marijuana Anonymous members meet almost every night in Orange County. On
this night, they're on the second floor of the Sister Elizabeth Building
near St. Joseph Hospital in Orange. The group originated in Orange County
more than 15 years ago and is patterned after the 12-step program for
recovering alcoholics or other addicts.

I came because a few months ago, I wrote about an Orange County Sheriff's
Department raid on a marijuana farm. In light of what seems to be a
softening of the public's mood regarding pot use, my glib take was to ask
whether the deputies' time was well-spent.

I won't be nearly as glib on the subject in the future. I don't know if
marijuana is addicting or not, but these people believe it is. That's
probably all that matters.

Before the meeting, 45-year-old Jim was warming up the coffee. "The
widespread belief is that [pot smoking] is not a big deal, that you really
don't get addicted to it," he says. "We call ourselves addicts. I say I'm
in recovery and definitely was addicted. I smoked daily for 13 years."

Those in the group of 16 drug users who chose to talk described lives
overrun by their need to smoke pot. They talked about friends and relatives
left in their wake, about lives they thought would be more enjoyable if
they could get high.

"I'm about to turn 14," Cleo says. "I know I'm pretty young to be in these
meetings."

She started smoking pot when she was about 8 or 9, she says. "I was a real
pot head back then. I could say I'm an addict, but it's taken me a long
time to say whether I'm an addict or not. I'm only 14. What does a
14-year-old know. But I started smoking at 8 and did it all the way to 14.
That's a long time. Normal kids don't do that." She concluded by thanking
everyone in the room for supporting her.

Gloria, 17, has been coming to MA for 18 months. Her first drug arrest, she
says, was at 10. She experimented with heroin at 11. "Now I'm clean," she
says. "I think how stupid I was."

Many of us play down pot-smoking. Many people have smoked it for years,
without apparent disabling effects. While we smile knowingly as well-known
figures like singer Willie Nelson talk about his recreational use, we
probably should also remember those who have lost themselves in the haze of
pot smoke.

"This meeting works," Gloria told the first-time attendees. "You find
friends here. You find honesty here. You find out who you really are."