A reader responds to my opinion column today on the war on drugs.
My late wife battled metatastized breast cancer for five years before dying at the end of a long painful struggle. I had to be the most adult I've ever been in my life while that occurred, while holding down a high-pressure superdupersecret job thingie [at a military base]. I had all that stress--making things at work that had never been attempted, much less successfully done--while not being able to see a shrink as it would adversely affect my superdupertopsecret clearance, then go home to a woman dying inch by painful inch.
In her last six months, the ONLY thing that allowed her to keep down any food was cannabis, and not that stupid pill Marinol either. Obviously, it's a pretty big dichotomy for Mr. TopSecret to go see the local corner dealer, but how hard is that (I have teenage kids and the irony of using my stepdaughter to score for Mom is an article unto itself). I was and am so disgusted with the bull and hyprocrisy surrounding this subject.
After my wife died but before I got rid of the rest of her stash, the company I worked for lost its contract; all us 'critical' employees were transferred without our knowledge. Lo and behold, I got a surprise urine analysis. I failed it; I freely admit that I partook (along with her) at the end of her life. My bad or good luck, depending (If I would have stayed with that company I'd be a contractor-target in Iraq), but the hilarious irony of the whole deal is that when I was informed that I was druggie scum by one of my bosses, a flaming DT-tembling alocholic with one hand on his Bible, he told me to ask the Lord for forgiveness. I found another job instead.
Drugs! Drugs? Booze is a drug. Asprin is a drug. Yes, I realize that the difference here is legal versus illegal, but our drug policy IS an abject failure and few folks have the guts to tell the emperor he has no clothes on...
One thing I do know, I'd do it again in a heartbeat if it would preserve the life of a loved one one more day.
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