I’m starting a new series of articles (not that I expect they will be read) about the things I observe while on my bike. I’ve been thinking about this for some time and have decided it’s finally time. I’ll post what I see and experience from time-to-time, hoping that it gives folks a different viewpoint as well as bring some questions of sustainability and human kindness. As I see it, regardless of whether you like bikes or do not, regardless of whether you find value in alternative transportation or prefer driving, a lot can be learned by slowing down and being thoughtful about one’s surroundings as riding a bike is often said to make people do. So, with that…

My commute is 12.5 miles each way and almost exclusively on side roads. I ride 4 days a week, shoving off well-before dawn, and then again in the late afternoon. I am doubtful that I am the only one having this experience, riding through neighborhoods and along 2 lane roads. Anyway…

I don’t believe smoking weed is medicine; I’m sorry, I just can’t get behind it. I also know lots of other people feel differently. I’m not saying there is zero medical value in the plant itself, I’m just saying that marijuana is the only substance I know of that is called “medicine” and which is also smoked. Perhaps I’m missing something, but having sat in numerous conferences, read the actual research, and seen it day-to-day in my work, I feel confident I’m not.

when the MJ lobby worked to influence legislation around the states, I remember clearly the argument that “people who use marijuana never go out and drive unsafely, because they just want to stay home and chill.” I can tell you, without a doubt, that is not true.

If that were true, I wouldn’t smell weed coming from cars on nearly every commute I make on my bike, day after day. Regardless of the season, at least once each morning and evening (often more frequently in the morning), I smell the reek of weed coming from a car that has just passed me by; nice car or beater, it doesn’t matter. Of course, I also smell it coming from porches and side alleys and other places as well, but I am doubtless that people are smoking weed and driving. I feel a little less strongly about the wake and bake dog walkers, but I thin it likely that even they have to get behind the wheel at some point in the morning.

Of course, I also know that in Utah, smoking the substance is not an “approved route of administration,” and that people who are smoking while driving are not following their prescribers advice or the law, but it seems like none of that matters now that cannabis has gained much wider acceptance. I think he reality is, most folks are diving around with their windows up in the winter and up in the summer and are more-or-less cut off from the scent of dryer sheets coming from a home or the smell of sweet perfume that lingers are after its wearer has since departed the driveway; they may be missing what I think is a real problem.

What’s to be done? Likely nothing, considering there is no slowing of legislative momentum, even though the science about the deleterious effects of regular use of high-potency marijuana is starting to roll in. Smoking weed or not, it feels to me like more and more people are driving around under the influence of SOMETHING and it’s just where we are as a country today. I want people to benefit from the science and the research that has given us the quality of life we enjoy today and yet, I don’t believe that smoking flower marijuana is that. Just last night, I spoke to a professional whose well-educated 30-year old son is stuck in the basement smoking weed and playing video games after having lost a prestigious job due to his increasing use. The father is heartbroken and stuck because his son whole-heartedly believes his marijuana smoking use is medicating his ills. It’s a shame to have heard this story and also to know, he is definitely driving high.