My Life in Weed: The Guardian Has a Piece by a Former Humboldt County Trimmer

Trimmer

Trimming marijuana [Stock photo by Kym Kemp]

The author of a new piece in the Guardian was a flower child–not of Humboldt County but of Oregon’s marijuana cultivators. But the fragrance of her story will moisten the eye of any nostalgic for the old days of growing. And, she spent many years in as a trimmer in the Emerald Triangle during the Green Rush.

She writes,

In the beginning, there was weed. My dad and I would walk down the gravel road and up a path through the woods to his patch, where the plants were partially hidden by a canopy of maples. It wasn’t an ideal spot for sunlight, but it was an ideal spot for hiding. My dad would carry bags of fertilizer on foot for a mile so that our truck was never spotted in the vicinity.

But, she has other memories:

I was the first to spot the Swat team –uniformed men with big guns advancing up our driveway. Everything happened very quickly: they held the adults at gunpoint and ransacked the house. As they handcuffed my dad, my cousin Jose started screaming hysterically because he thought they were actually cutting off Steve’s hands.

And more mundane but still unpleasant ones:

A lot of people thought it was cool to be surrounded by so much weed, but I didn’t. I didn’t find weed romantic and I hated trimming. Resin gummed up my scissors and burnt my eyes. We couldn’t sit outside because of helicopter surveillance, so we worked in a filthy shack, 14-hour days, seven days a week. I developed carpal tunnel syndrome and an allergy that puffed up my face and impaired my vision.

As preparation for the traditional marijuana holiday, 4/20, this story is a salute to old days and the path through the beginning days of legalization till now.

Well worth the read. Click here to be taken to the story.

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24 Comments
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Guest
Guest
Guest
2 years ago

Ah! The good ol’ days of child labor, hiding from helicopters, watching the police drag off parents… As the author puts it- “I don’t mourn the old days. “

Groba dude, trustafarian osn't
Guest
Groba dude, trustafarian osn't
2 years ago
Reply to  Guest

Marijuana is evil. It saps your will, makes you think you’re happy when you are only toiling, suffering…

That said, I also spent my life toiling in an industry with my father…

We worked in a 900 Sq. Ft. office on the main street of Yuba City, an office I worked in for 29 years, even after the Federal Government destroyed our industry with incredible, stupid and arbitrary laws, and forced up to give up our business to a giant corporation, which I was then involved with for another 10 years…

Yes, my children could have also worked by my side, but in the end I had to move from my home, traipse all over Northern California to finish out my career…

Yes, life is full of work, and it’s a long career, full of ups and downs.

As far as weed is concerned, weed is a trap, which captured many, and which still captures many… Our environment suffers daily, and all those counter-culturists who think they should make a living as “small farmers”, they should have been planning, thinking bigger!

You should have become the “Cannabis Guru” for Mendocino County, the plutocrat landowner waiting for commercial legalization, you should have bought that bare land in Lake County, now covered in “greenhouses”…

Planning ahead might not have worked out for you either! In an evolving industry, you might find yourself out in the cold, unable to compete with the Kern County Mega-Farms, behind fences and fully capable of stamping out ounces, infused caramels, oils and “medicines”… The competition will kill many of those “Smuffy Smiff” operations, but what really worries me is the Fentanyl Sprayed weed from the Cartel…

Opioid-Tainted Marijuana from Humboldt may well be the end of Mendo and Humboldt and Trinity farmers…

You read it here first, and, I guarantee, you can’t depend on tomorrow, just as you can’t depend on rain…

Thanks for your story, the continuing treatise on life as the child of a Pot Farmer… It’s a new dawn, but while your parent’s choices will linger in your psyche, probably for life, you still have choices and a full life of opportunity…

NorCalNative
Guest
NorCalNative
2 years ago

More funny stuff from our resident cannabis-hater aka VMG.

thetallone
Guest
thetallone
2 years ago
Reply to  NorCalNative

He hallucinates very well for a non-stoner. Happy 420, y’all.

VMG
Guest
VMG
2 years ago
Reply to  NorCalNative

I don’t hate anything… I do dislike the environmental and social degradation marijuana has caused, and the dependency of the folks who grow weed as a cash crop.

I hope everyone is happy with the results of having a “drug culture” in your backyards for 60 years…

I used to think life was too short not to smoke weed, but now I know that weed isn’t all that enjoyable. You have to quit using it to really understand…

Brother, don’t assume you know things, and don’t project your traits on others! You will be disappointed less!

Namaste, NCN, be safe and be well…

Willow Creeker
Guest
Willow Creeker
2 years ago
Reply to  VMG

Well, when you use phrases like ‘marijuana is evil’ it doesn’t help your otherwise sound case. There are good and bad sides to the marijuana business, just like any business. It has no inherent evil. Just like it’s not a miracle balm that cures cancer and everything else. It’s cured a lot of empty wallets in this county, and it’s caused a lot of headaches also.

VMG
Guest
VMG
2 years ago
Reply to  Willow Creeker

Let’s accept that it was first grown on the North Coast to allow folks to have the things they needed, like food, clothing, and shelter. As the folks found out, the money was right.

Money is the evil, in the end, but marijuana use still takes a toll on youth, sensibilities, and society.

The ultimate test, will be when all the folks currently vying to “fill their wallets” find out that the market is moving to large producers who grow nearer to the consumers… Undoubtedly, weed has been grown in warehouses, vacant malls, and anywhere else it was able to be hidden. Now it will be grown in large greenhouses, practically everywhere, and by nearly anyone who wants to “cash-in”…

I hope you can continue to do the work that this lady was traumatized by, and the culture which forced her to “trim” when she was a child, will evolve to a culture where farmworkers do the labor… Maybe the counter-culturists will go back to a more sustainable method of existence, and the guys in the grow-dozers running everyone else off the road, and the guys from the cartels who everyone is afraid of, will be forced to go do their dirty-work somewhere else.

As long as there is somebody growing off-grid, and selling on the black market, some children, somewhere, will still be trimming. In my opinion, the trauma this author felt during her childhood, was the point of the story, and the point wasn’t whether or not you and your friends had something in their wallets, or not… The damage that North Coast pot-farming has done goes far beyond the environmental disaster growers have created, but I wouldn’t bother arguing with you about that!

Namaste, WC, be well!

Littlefoot
Guest
Littlefoot
2 years ago
Reply to  VMG

Cannabis causes introspection. Some people are uncomfortable in a state of introspection and say things like, “weed makes me paranoid.” What they really mean is, “weed makes me notice all the things I don’t like about myself”. Fix yourself, stop blaming the plant.

VMG
Guest
VMG
2 years ago
Reply to  Littlefoot

Cannabis induces a delusional state of consciousness, where the user is “switched onto a different channel”, or maybe just “stuck between channels”…

Think of it like this: “screwed sideways, with a left handed thread, through a blurry mirror, into a land where you think you are fine when you are just, really, shorted out, showering sparks from the raw ends of what used to be your wiring…”

Read Hunter S. Thompson, who referred to himself as an “aging, jaded, drug dilettante”, before he blew his brains out, when his health failed…

You know what, I smoked Humboldt weed, in microdoses, daily, for years… When it started to feel like dementia, instead of just helping me to deal with life and other people, I had to quit…

Now, nearly 70, and facing dissolution plus eventual death, I feel totally different about marijuana, consider it to be poorly indicated for nearly everyone, and when I look at what weed did to Northern California, where I spent my entire life, I feel only revulsion, frank disgust for the drug culture…

Honestly, I spent several years living in lower Redway, a beautiful place with many problems… Nobody ever invaded my home, fed me acid, or sodomized me, but, my neighbors were cutting back 1000 year old Redwood Trees and building hoop-houses, when they weren’t selling Meth and Smack and Pounds, and, I finally just had to leave… Humboldt is no place to be clean and sober!

So you smoke all you want, and eventually, you might change your mind. Don’t think you can convince me with your thoughts of “introspection”, since I already had those thoughts, back in, oh, 1967 or so…

You are now welcome to handle, grow, deal, and use marijuana! Please remember, it was illegal, most of my life. If I had been able to grow, deal, and use without fear of incarceration, maybe I would have felt differently!

Namaste Littlefoot, be safe, be well…

Lost Croat Outburst
Guest
Lost Croat Outburst
2 years ago
Reply to  VMG

I’m 71 and have an entirely different history with the power plant. Biggest problems I have had were legal, imposed by the law. You didn’t like it and quit. Good for you. We have a rampant caffeine, alcohol and nicotine culture but that’s OK? Always amazing when people talk about “drug culture” like it’s something new. 2021 and we’re still wading through this kind of crap.

NorCalNative
Guest
NorCalNative
2 years ago
Reply to  VMG

“Brother, don’t assume you know things,…”

VMG, here’s what I know: Each individual has a unique genome, microbiome, and endocannabinoid system that makes them respond uniquely to whatever substance they ingest.

I appreciate your personal anecdotes about cannabis, however your experience is your experience.

The health care industry that trained you is mostly ignorant by design which equals “dated” doctors and “dated” health professionals.

A smart physician would investigate and rule out cannabis if required, FIRST. Due to the safety of cannabinoids they should be used before more harmful pharmaceuticals.

In my case as a senior, instead of taking many medications (polypharmacy) I take only one.

Here’s the main problems with medical cannabis. Lack of training, the fact certain individuals can’t genetically access cannatherapeutics.

Medical weed is NOT for everyone. It’s as much art as it is science.

I’ve looked over a dozen doc’s in the eyes and called them “dated.” I’m adding you to that list.

HotCoffee
Guest
HotCoffee
2 years ago
Reply to  NorCalNative

I agree.

It also seems personality is involved.
The dumb act dumber, the creative more creative, disciplined remain so,. the paranoid are more so, the reckless, the thoughtful, the health conscious, the greedy, etc.

It seems to be an enhancer.

Just my long term observation.

VMG
Guest
VMG
2 years ago
Reply to  NorCalNative

Careful, we agree on many items… We agree that Western Medicine is focused incorrectly on maximizing profits for Pharmaceutical and Medical Care Corporations…

I think that many of the drugs Seniors are weighed down with are dangerous, useless, and, have too many side effects… I am particularly concerned with “off-label” uses for certain drugs, and, the fact that drug abusers, and, seniors who “doctor-shop” in order to obtain drugs to sell to street dealers, the seniors that have limited everyone’s access to important and effective drugs because the government has literally banned opioids and benzodiazepines among other drugs…

I don’t take pills either, but in my opinion, cannabinoids are highly expensive, have limited effectiveness, and, some of the products on the market are not tested clean or grown organically or with any circumspection at all…

If I wanted any cannabis, and I don’t, I would grow it myself. I would urge any Senior-Citizen to do the same. As far as extractions, distillates, oils and synthesis of Terpenoids for medical use, these need further study to be considered to be useful or effective. I would only trust water-extraction, possibly ethanol extraction, as far as organic solvents are concerned.

But then, we were talking about culture, child abuse, and trauma…

Namaste NCN, be well!

Readbetweenthelines
Guest
2 years ago
Reply to  VMG

“products on the market are not tested clean” How do you know this?

Lost Croat Outburst
Guest
Lost Croat Outburst
2 years ago
Reply to  NorCalNative

Oh, wow, he’s so Right-On he has to use different handles. Funny. I get the idea of anonymity, but it’s nice to identify with one entity. I guess multiple names multiplies the gibberish so it looks like a crowd, man, speaking in tongues and shit. Heavy trips, dudes and dudettes.

Oh, wait, I do agree that ice water extraction is excellent, if not super efficient and tinctures of grain (drinking) alcohol are good. Home-growing is good.

Lost Croat Outburst
Guest
Lost Croat Outburst
2 years ago

So, you toiled with your father under duress and unfairness and bitterness, but you blame people for going to the woods and trying something different that also, for them, was problematic , and then flip out on sanctimonious claims of moral and ethical superiority.

Yeah, please never consume cannabis again, it obviously doesn’t work for you and you’re giving all the rest of us a bad name. Captain Buzzkill.

Rio
Guest
Rio
2 years ago

Back when it was fun

Pooi
Guest
Pooi
2 years ago

So lame to steal the beginning from jack. His house is the only house

Bill
Guest
Bill
2 years ago

I too mourn the old days. Days when you grew what you wanted, a little bit more to sell to some friends (mostly from out of the area) and live a more balanced life with your surroundings and your community.

Now, forget it, it is all about getting mine now and as much as I can all at once. Screw the surroundings, the community, and for damn sure screw the environment. What I have seen in the past 20-30 years is horrendous, and now we have legal mega grows being grown in our hills, and sensitive Oak woodland habitats.

Disgraceful what the growers are doing, and disgraceful what the Planning Department and Planning Commission and Board of Supervisors are allowing to take place in our beautiful hills and mountains.

Oak woodlands they are now finding out are as much ecologically signifcant or more so than an Old Growth forest. How in the hell are we then allowing these grows to be placed in these exact areas because of some loop hole in the permitting process due to them being classified as “agricultural soils”!!

MWM
Guest
MWM
2 years ago
Reply to  Bill

Quit worrying so much! We’ll all be dead someday, so who cares?

Lost Croat Outburst
Guest
Lost Croat Outburst
2 years ago
Reply to  Bill

Thousands of acres of prime, productive oak woodland have been sacrificed for vineyards, way more than for cannabis. Oh, but that’s cool, man. See, we don’t have an alcohol drug culture, we just consume zillions of gallons of wine, beer, liquor, you-name it. It’s the potheads with their drug culture, um, ah dudes.

Mendocino Mamma
Guest
Mendocino Mamma
2 years ago

That picture!!! ROTFLMFAO!!! Just picked it up for the photo op???. Clean hands, shiny nails. Like the time this one young hopeful showed up at the grow to help harvest in a fuzzy white vest and spiked boots! CRIPE!

Guest
Guest
Guest
2 years ago

Booooohoooooo sad face I’ll save my time for something positive

Puke
Guest
Puke
2 years ago

One persons truth. Hardly notable to publish. What a negative publicity.
But i guess it fits the negative narrative that the anti cannabis folks like to read.
Puke