This 100,000th article milestone has the ring of a "What MAP Means to
Me" essay. Here's mine.

Three years ago, I realized that I had a passionate interest in drug
policy, one that began more than twenty years ago when I first joined
NORML. I began to closely follow Richard Cowan's marijuananews.com and
decided to e-mail him about my background and interest and where they
could be best applied in the movement. His response was to e-mail, as
he put it, the "usual suspects": Mark Greer of DrugSense and Allen St.
Pierre of NORML. Mark replied first. As they say, the rest is history.

The genius of MAP is that you can be involved at many levels depending
on your interest. If you don't have much time, you can write an
occasional letter or post an occasional article. If your interest and
time go deeper, you can become an editor or a regular,
nationally-published writer. No experience necessary other than a
passion to end the drug war.

An added benefit of MAP has been networking for those of us who desire
true immersion in this issue. Through my involvement with MAP, I heard
about a seminar on cannabis that was going to be held at Ohio State
University. I attended it and a month later several of us formed the
Ohio Patient Network, one of Drug Policy Central's very grateful hostees.

When I started following MAP, the article count was no more than
30,000 or so, quite a lot I thought. We are now the 100,000 pound
gorilla in the room whenever the discussion turns to drug policy. The
moral of the story: committed individuals can come together and change
the world. Didn't Margaret Mead say we're the only force that ever
has!

Let's keep up the fantastic work. I'd say that I'd like to see us
celebrate 1,000,000 clippings, but I hope that the drug war ends
decades before that!

I love you all!

Mary Jane Borden