I've taken plenty of heat from readers about my column last week describing how easy it was for me to legally buy marijuana.
Most chastised me for flushing my pot down the toilet before trying it, calling it a cowardly cop-out, a threat to the safety of the region's water supply and a missed opportunity to let others know what kind of pain relief marijuana actually provides.
"Flushing good medicine down the toilet was a silly, wasteful gesture," e-mailed Michael Levitt, a 52-year-old who uses marijuana to treat his diabetes and high blood pressure and ran a dispensary in Canoga Park until the feds forced him to shut down last year.
I dumped the pot for legal reasons and because I'd accomplished my journalistic mission by buying it. As a columnist and a parent, I was more interested in seeing how easy it was to get it than discovering the effect of marijuana on my arthritic hands.
But I've learned enough from readers this week to understand why some consider it a wonder drug: The registered nurse crippled by a genetic joint disease who was able to toss her Vicodin and use her hands again. The disabled veteran with kidney failure who was vomiting every day until he began smoking marijuana. The single dad confined to a wheelchair after a traffic accident who is now able to climb a flight of stairs.
And I was surprised that I could have learned how easy the process of buying marijuana is by hanging around the mall, talking to 18-year-olds.
In the 12 years since California became the first state in the nation to legalize marijuana for medical use, the drug's distribution network has grown from a small collective of cannabis clubs to a sprawling network of unregulated dispensaries -- some with their own prescribing physicians.
Their competition plays out bluntly online and in ads like these in LA Weekly: Free delivery. Medical Cannabis to your door! Bonus gifts. Free joint for every new patient. Instant medical approval. If you don't qualify, your visit is free! Money-saving coupons. Discounts for Medi-Cal/Medicare.
In the week since my column ran, I've talked with more than a dozen high school and college students -- honor students and chronic truants, the kids of corporate lawyers and immigrant housecleaners, everyday smokers and teens who've never even seen it. Everyone said they have friends who have used marijuana, and they're not the loser potheads of my youth:
