4/20 brings cannabis ‘brethren’ together in celebration

As you read these words today, someone is more than likely getting high.
Today is April 20. Also known as 420, it has become something of a cult- alternative holiday for hippies, stoners and medical marijuana cardholders due to a troupe of high school boys from San Rafael, Calif. known as The Waldos.

Note, 420 does not come from a police code for the smoking of marijuana. Myth aside, the origins of this underground holiday lay with The Waldos and their code for getting high after school in the 1970’s.

According to a 2009 article from The Huffington Post titled “What 420 means: The True Story Behind Stoner’s Favorite Number,” the five friends heard about a Coast Guard member who couldn’t tend to his crop of marijuana and they, being athletes, met after practice by a wall and a statue of Louis Pasteur at 4:20 p.m. to start a search for the crop. As the story goes, they never found it, but did find a new code word for getting high: 420.

The term then spread to The Grateful Dead via their bassist Phil Lesh, who was friends with one of The Waldos’ older brothers, according to The Huffington Post article. As The Dead, being world-famous musicians, toured all over the globe, the term spread with them.

With the origins of 420 cleared up, how does one celebrate a holiday that glorifies something illegal?

Mark Herer, owner of The Third Eye Shoppe, a headshop in southeast Portland, starts with defining when to celebrate. He prefers the phrase 20 after. “I really almost like (it) more than 420, because, hell, every hour on the hour,” said Herer, adding that it’s a time for like-minded people to be “breaking bread with their fellow brethren the world over. Friday just happens to be a special day for us hippies.”

Herer also said that while he considers 420 to be a holiday, his shop remains open, even though he takes the day off, as it is also his eighth wedding anniversary. He said that as the weather should be nice, he’ll spend most of it in the garden.

“Celebrate your accomplishments and then wake the next day ready to go back to work and keep kicking ass,” said Herer of the 420 festivities.
In addition to gardening, Herer and his siblings, will use 420 to honor their father, Jack, who died two years ago on April 15.

“Dad is buried in L.A., so my brothers on 4/20 at 4:20 p.m. will go down to the grave site, probably share a joint, and talk to dad for awhile. At that same time, in my space, where I am, I’ll share that same energy, without even having to be on the phone and we’ll all be together. As will, I hope, my sisters,” said Herer.

As controversial as 420 may be, it’s another opportunity to look at how, according to many self-proclaimed hippies and activists, marijuana’s male plant counter-part, hemp, can solve many of the world’s problems.

As far as accomplishments go for the medical marijuana and the marijuana/hemp community at large, hemp has become legal to grow for industrial purposes in Hawaii, and it’s technically allowed to be grown with a Drug Enforcement Agency permit, though it is a very stringent process.

However, according to Herer, the fact that bolts of hemp fiber are being imported is both a good and bad thing, as it shows that the plant is being recognized for its uses but that it has to come from overseas when it could be grown locally.

Herer pulls much of his information about hemp and marijuana from his father’s book “The Emperor Wears No Clothes,” a book about the history and uses of both plants.

“It’s not to be confused with Hans Christian Andersen’s ‘The Emperor’s New Clothes.’ It’s more about the conspiracy of marijuana. It’s totally about the conspiracy,” said Herer on the book’s title.

According to Herer and the book, hemp is the only available natural resource that could replace other resources such as timber, tree-pulp paper, cotton, all fossil fuels and reverse greenhouse gases in the atmosphere due to the emission of carbon dioxide molecules back into the air when hemp is burned. It’s also not only edible, but according to a 1996 movie review of “The Hemp Revolution,” published by the activist publication Monthly Review, hemp is the second most protein rich vegetable after soybeans.

Herer still believes that hemp is the miracle to save the planet from its woes such as pollution, acid rain and deforestation due to its ability to leave the soil in better condition after it is planted and to be used as an alternative to lumber.

This idea is supported by a report cited in “The Emperor Wears No Clothes.” In the report Adam Beatty, vice president of the Kentucky Agricultural Society, shows that hemp crops grew in the same fields for 14 years without any problems.

However, marijuana is not without some skeptics.
“Studying marijuana is difficult– it is still classified as a Schedule I drug of abuse by the DEA, which means it has a high potential for abuse and no accepted medicinal value, according to the federal government … this means it is difficult, not impossible, for scientists to get their hands on THC and/or funding to study THC,” said Laird Sheldahl, MHCC Anatomy & Physiology instructor, adding that it’s hard to get studies because the government would be trying to talk to illegal drug users if that were the case.

Sheldahl said smoking marijuana seems to be the most harmful of it’s uses, as it contains some of the same carcinogenic hydrocarbons as tobacco smoke. But after many studies, it doesn’t show the same predilection towards lung cancer as tobacco smoke.

“This should be good reason to do more research, imagine if we could distill this chemical in pill form, away from the carcinogens in the smoke,” said Sheldahl of the painkilling potential of marijuana, adding that some similar compounds, called cannabinoids, such as CB-2 medication, mimics some of the effects of THC.

“I bet THC is the much more common choice for people treating chronic pain disorders, like fibromyalgia.  Maybe brownies are just more fun than pills, but I’m guessing getting stoned is the best part of medical marijuana for many Oregonians,” said Sheldahl.