DEALING WITH THE DRUG CULTURE

When Suzy Wells Discovered That Her Son Grew Cannabis, She Decided To Turn
A Blind Eye - In Return For More Revision.

'I WISH one could do A-level drugs," mused my 16-year-old son the other
day. It was a remark that should have sent shivers down my spine. Instead,
I laughed. What my son meant, I think, is that he is interested in why
people take drugs, the culture that surrounds them and the altered states
that various substances, legal and illegal, produce. My son was introduced
to the idea of illegal drugs at primary school during class discussions. He
could not, at that stage, imagine wanting to take any drug, bar Calpol, and
was almost evangelical in his distaste for smoking. He tried hard, but
sadly failed to persuade his father to give up cigarettes.

At his secondary school, an inner-city comprehensive, his drugs education
continued, initially within the confines of the classroom. The various
categories of drugs were explained, and the dangers clearly spelt out. From
the start, PSE (personal and social education) was his favourite subject,
offering pupils the chance to debate issues such as racism.

From Year 8, when he was 13, there were wild rumours of drug dealing. One
boy was said to be "photocopying LSD" and attempting to sell it to gullible
classmates. In Year 9, my son and his friends took their first puffs of
cannabis at a sleepover. The drug had been grown by the parents of the girl
who was giving the party.

In a city such as ours, which is full of students, cannabis is easy to
obtain if you know whom to ask. By the time my son reached 15, about half
his classmates were smoking dope. They included the highest achiever in the
year. Significantly, he gave up smoking it during GCSEs.

Last autumn, I sensed something was afoot. Aided by a couple of mates, my
son had fixed a bolt to his bedroom door and had rearranged his furniture
so that his bed was wedged across his cupboard door.

Two days later, my husband, searching for his rucksack, opened my son's
cupboard and revealed a carefully fabricated propagation system, complete
with lamp. Four brown seeds were sending out tiny, tender shoots.

You can, I have since discovered, purchase cannabis sativa seeds at the
kind of shop that sells joss sticks and scented candles. Ostensibly, they
are sold for fishing bait. All the instructions for propagation, potting
and repotting, nurturing and harvesting cannabis are available on the
Internet.

My son's first attempt to cultivate cannabis failed. His second attempt was
spectacularly successful. As I write, two lusty plants with their
distinctive spiky leaves are growing at the bottom of our garden. They make
me feel slightly anxious - and some of our visitors have been careful to
avert their eyes.

Am I being soft? It is a question I often ask myself, especially since I
learnt from the parents of one of my son's friends that I was clearly a
"cool" mother, quite happy for my son to visit the coffee shops of
Amsterdam during the summer.

This is just not the case. I certainly would not wish to encourage my son
to take drugs, or dabble in illegal activities.

This is an age of deals. An unspoken bargain was struck: the botany
experiment could continue, in return for a schedule of revision. A
timetable of work went up on the fridge door and was, more or less, adhered
to in the weeks leading up to the mock exams. My son's results were better
than expected.

Almost exactly 30 years ago, my mother overheard a conversation between my
teenage brother and an older boy. My brother let slip that some South
African boys at his independent school were planning to bring dope back to
distribute the following term.

Later that day, my mother persuaded my brother to tell her more. She then
rang the headmaster. The boys were expelled and my brother (much to his
relief) never returned to the school.

I have no doubt that my mother was "right" - and I am probably "wrong". In
terms of the slippery slope, today's "it's only cannabis" can all too
easily become tomorrow's "it's only ecstasy", and so on.

Much has changed since the Seventies, and my son's teenage life is very
different from mine. While I went to boarding school and, in the holidays,
was ferried to and from parties held in friends' houses, he has created his
own social scene.

Widespread as cannabis consumption is, the police continue to take a dim
view of it. Last term, my son arrived home from school ashen-faced to tell
me that he had been caught smoking a joint in his lunchbreak. He was given
a verbal warning and I had a visit from a young, and very earnest,
policeman. He suggested my son should be more careful.

Cannabis, says my son, creates a bond between people. "Offering it is a
sign of friendship. It's something you have to share. It could lead to
taking other mild hallucinogens, such as magic mushrooms, but I definitely
wouldn't take LSD. That's scary." Let's hope so.

I sometimes wish my son's enthusiasms were cricket or computer programming
- - but that would be wanting him to be a different person.

In lots of ways, I admire him: he is a child of his time in a way I never
was. He enjoys discussing his experiences and feelings with adults. I am
sure he does not tell me everything. Why should he? He is finding out who
he is.

Suzy Wells is a pen name