A Little Help From My Friends

The mother of one of my son's friends came over recently to tell me that she was afraid that some of the kids my son's been friends with for years were doing drugs. "I'm so sorry to drop this in your lap," she said. She gave me reasons for this fear, and named some names. She also expressed that, in her opinion, it would be a mistake to let my son spend time around these kids any more. "I'm just afraid that they'll drag him down. He's avoided all this mess."

It's a legitimate concern. Kids do drugs. They drink. They have unprotected sex with people they barely know, or like, well enough to speak to. Awful things happen. I don't mean to minimize the dangers or possibilities. Also, my son is a bright, ambitious, sober 18 year old, about to head off to a university hundreds of miles away. Now is not the time to derail.

Still, I am not really worried. I have not laid down any ultimatums.

Please, do not feel the need to "enlighten" me with horror stories. Please do not tell me that every parent thinks, "It won't happen to my kid." I know these things. I do. I don't feel that my child, or his friends, are angelic or perfect. I also do not feel that substance abuse is a rite of passage, and nothing to be alarmed about (or worse, necessary).

To understand how I feel, you have to understand me. To understand me, we have to go back, more than 30 years. We have to go back to high school.

In junior high (for me, 6th - 8th grade, fall 1977 - spring 1980) I knew a few kids who drank, and a few who did drugs. Most of my close friends were pretty sober, but I did know people who engaged in various risky or improper behaviors.

I once mentioned to my husband, in passing, that I'd learned to carry my purse from a successful purse snatcher and pickpocket.  "WHAT?" he responded. He found this fact bizarre and astonishing, and in need of an explanation.

I explained that my friend W had made a pretty tidy sum stealing purses and wallets. He'd shown me how to carry my stuff to minimize the chances that someone would take mine. He was a pretty good teacher. The only time someone's ever taken my bag, I walked out of a restaurant and left it there.

I started high school in the fall of 1980, and graduated in the spring of 1984.

Drugs were not hard to find. Alcohol was even easier. I mean, it was high school.

I spent most of my time in the theater department. I was also on the debate team, the yearbook staff and the newspaper staff. My friends ranged from total outcasts to the pretty and popular. I see no reason to dislike people unless they make it abundantly clear that they dislike me. Even then, I usually wish them well - just from a distance.

I have never had a thing for bad boys. I also did not swoon over jocks. My friends would obsess over how cute #42's butt was, or how mysterious the brooding James Dean wannabe in leather was, and it would just bore me. I tended to get crushes on the quirky, nerdy guys. Guys who can carry on an intelligent and funny conversation did it for me (and still do). As a freshman, I had no interest in the blue eyed, blond football player named Nick who sat next to me in science, but I was fascinated by the guy named John who sat in front of me and was in ROTC (the HEIGHT of uncool at my high school). He had painted his car to look like a tank, complete with turret on the roof. He was also witty.

Honestly, though, both my male and female friends saw me as some kind of third gender. I didn't date in high school.

I did hang around with a very large, very tightly knit group of kids. It felt like a family then, and it still feels like a family now.

A significant percentage of these kids did drugs and/or drank to excess. Not all, but enough to be over the 51% required to call it the majority. Some kids also dealt drugs, including one of my best friends. (He thought that no one would notice that he was buying himself sports cars with cash, while working at McDonald's.) Some went way beyond "sexually active" and into "promiscuous." One had his own still. (His "brew" was locally famous, and reputed to be high proof.)

This behavior was never what attracted me to any of them. I tended to view it with a middle aged attitude, hovering between fear and exasperation. I kept waiting for all of them to grow out of it.

On the other hand, they kept expecting me to grow up and get with the program and act like everybody else. They were fine with me as I was, though. They had no investment in making me change.

Even when I started driving a van, and took on the role of designated driver (before there was even a term for it), and was therefore fairly often at parties with very intoxicated people, I felt no pressure to drink or do drugs. None. Zero. I not only have never been intoxicated, I have never tasted a beer, or a joint, or many other substances. I take no credit and expect no admiration, because it took no effort at all. I'm not the only one who made it through school - or life - this way, either. I can introduce you to a number of us. It's not superhuman. It's fairly ordinary.

Almost no one offered alcohol or drugs to me, and those who did were satisfied with a simple, "No thanks." Let me tell you, nothing promotes sobriety more than being the only sober one in a room.  Intoxicated people have no idea how ridiculous they look and sound.

Others occasionally refused for me, with much more vehemence than I would have used. Once, someone offered me hallucinogenic mushrooms, and I said the customary, "No, thanks." Their response was a simple, "OK," and I thought that would be the end of it. Another friend leapt in.

"Don't EVER offer her anything like that again! EVER!"

The first friend was shocked. They thought they were being courteous, offering to share. They started to justify - "They're all natural. They're organic. The Native Americans have used them in their religious rituals for centuries..."

"I don't care! NEVER offer Sharon something like that!"

"It's OK," I said.

"No! It's not! It's against your religion!"

"I can say 'no' on my own."

"You shouldn't have to!"

They were protective, especially when they, themselves, were sober.

Still, it wasn't always pretty. I have been vomited on. I have cleaned up someone else's car - a Cadillac - in the middle of the night before the owner's children could return it home. I have sat next to a bed, making sure the sleeper's head hung slightly over the side. One of my dad's stories from his career at the fire department was about a coworker who fell asleep intoxicated and drowned in his own vomit; I was terrified that I would lose someone that I loved. Long before I became a parent, I had no qualms about dealing with the bodily fluids and functions of others.

Long after high school, I worried that someone would overdose, or die in a DUI crash, or be arrested for trafficking.

I never questioned whether they loved me. I felt very loved. I can't imagine that they ever questioned whether or not I loved them. My kids grew up calling many of these people "Aunt" and "Uncle." Most others, they know on a first name basis. I do not understand people who must be surrounded by others who agree with them, and behave in similar ways. Even at the age at which people tend to be the most judgmental and exclusionary, adolescence, we all held it together, loving people who were very, very different from ourselves.

At the time, many people (mostly adults) assured me that it was temporary. We'd never even see each other after high school, except for maybe at school reunions, they said. See the preceding paragraph; some of us are now grandparents, and we still love each other. We are still a part of each other's lives. My kids have "cousins" who are totally unrelated to them. We - the theater department of our high school - hold our own reunions, encompassing about 8 graduation years, because attending school reunions means that we're limited to seeing those from a single graduation year.

My mother always knew who was doing what (and with whom). She knew who took 1/2 an inch at a time from all the liquor bottles in the cabinet, combined and drank it in a concoction called "death." She knew who owned the still. She knew how my friend bought his sports cars. She knew who raided their parents' stash, and whose parents let them (and others) drink at home. I told her, the other kids told her - nobody hid things from my mom. She loved them anyway. This is not because my mother was enabling and trying to be cool. She would have preferred it if they were all sober and virginal. There were clear, iron clad rules. There would be none of this at her house or on her property, whether she was home or not. (No one ever violated this rule.) She would prefer it if it didn't happen in front of her kid, but she left that up to me. She would not give anyone money or bail anyone out. If you screwed up, it was on you. If you followed her rules, you were always welcome in her home. And I mean always - two kids once showed up at 11:30 at night to ask for a fudgesicle. She let them sleep at our house, and had no trouble letting me spend time at their houses.

And they all loved her. Until the end of her life, many of them called her Mom.

One of my siblings once argued with my mom that she was showing favoritism. "You hate my friends! You love Sharon's friends, and they do way worse stuff than mine do!" (This is debatable, but Mom didn't bother.) Her response was immediate and succinct.

"That's because Sharon has never felt compelled to act like her friends."

I thought about that statement when the mother came to me with her concerns about my son's friends.

I know that my son is not me, and that his friends are not my friends. I also know what kind of people they are.

My son is very secure in his beliefs and behaviors. He is bright, personable, friendly and not easily swayed. He doesn't drink, he doesn't use drugs, and I don't see him starting, even if someone makes it available. He is secure being the only "different" one, he is OK with being teased. He can walk away when he needs to. He does not cave in to pressure in order to fit in. If he was a different type of personality, things might be different.

The friends in question are great kids. I'm not going to swear that they've never done something stupid, because they're human, they're kids, and their brains aren't done forming yet. Plus, not everyone believes in lifelong teetotaling. Still, I cannot conceive of them as being so far gone that they're a danger to my kid.

I thought about my mother's reaction to my friends. I thought about how my life would be immeasurably emptier without them in it. I thought about the people my son has added to our family - because they are family. They are not disposable.

Three of my kids are adults, and one is a teen, so we can have conversations that may have been iffy when they were younger.

"Can you imagine," I asked, "how all of our lives would be different if Grandma had insisted that I couldn't be around Aunt B any more?" Their Aunt B spent years intoxicated on a daily basis, in a household where adults could be absent for weeks at a time. My kids know this, and they know how much their grandma loved Aunt B. "Can you even imagine Aunt B being a bad influence?" Their shocked looks said that they could not.

I had a conversation with the kids in question, and their moms. They knew what had been said. I did not ask what they may or may not have done. I did not threaten, or lecture. I said, "Do we have to have a conversation about what I consider to be acceptable behavior?"

They laughed. "No, Mom." They know.

I said to my son, "Even if other people lose their minds, I expect you not to lose yours."

"I know, Mom."

I asked the other parents, "Are you worried?"

"Not at all."

"OK, then. We're all clear."

In 30 years, maybe they'll have similar conversations with their kids, and be able to think of how their honorary aunts and uncles did not ruin their parents' lives. I hope so.

Legal Vices and Their Champions

I was recently asked to write sample newspaper columns, 700 words each or thereabouts, as a way of auditioning, if you will, for an opening at a local paper. They didn't hire me, which is OK - it turns out that they wanted someone well connected to the local political scene, and that's not me.

I've printed two of the sample columns below. The editor wanted my take on local issues. In light of the media coverage lately of Harry Reid's take on prostitution, and John Ensign's take on Harry's position (which, in my opinion, boiled down to "I won't take a stand, because then someone would disagree with me, and I'm trying to rebuild my credibility before I run for office again, hoping everyone will have forgotten the whole infidelity/bribery/misuse of funds and influence thing so I can return to office,") I thought I'd put my two cents out there.

Let's keep in mind, 700 words didn't give me enough space to address the whining about what the supposedly crushing loss of brothel revenue would mean. First and foremost, whenever anyone says that without the brothels and their fees, the rural economies would be crippled, the schools will close, there will be fewer police officers, firefighters, apple pie, baseball and everything good, I feel like saying, "You're so right. There are no rural counties anywhere else in the other 49 states and the District of Columbia that manage to function without brothel income." Give me a break. And for the rest of my feelings, see my take on legalized marijuana. The arguments are interchangeable.

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I have lived in Nevada for my entire life – I was born at St. Mary's Regional Medical Center. I can sing "Home Means Nevada" and mean it. I am not here by default; I am here because I choose to be. Still, I cannot shake the feeling that occasionally overwhelms me that Nevadans do a good job of embarrassing themselves and the rest of us. I'm not talking about John Ensign, although I admit that his latest fiasco had me fuming, "Oh, thanks so much for making the rest of us look wonderful!" I mean some of our laws and policies that make me cringe.

I swear, the ink wasn't dry on the law allowing brothels to advertise before the tops of every taxicab in town were covered with glowing ads, ads I had to explain to my youngest child. I do not want to discuss the offered services with small children.

It's bad enough to live somewhere where I've seen, for my entire life, things like Yellow Pages ads for brothels that screamed, "It's legal here!" and "Private airstrip and limousines!" but now I have to endure ridiculous and even misleading advertising campaigns. Mind you, I don't want to see sex acts described 40 feet high, but I was astonished by the choices of words on the brothel billboards. One of the first ones I saw advertised a brothel on the way to a popular boating spot as a "deli." Truly! Can you imagine a family on the way to the reservoir pulling over hoping to buy potato salad and ham sandwiches?

"Resort and spa!" says one description. I've stayed at resorts, but I've always done so with my kids, and I doubt that many of their activities and services are available at a brothel. I doubt that I could get a facial there.

Even when they attempt to be a bit more accurate, I resent having to explain terms like "cage dance" to my kids. Would it be possible to simply say, "Adult entertainment; must be 21"?

I used to look around Las Vegas and say, "At least Reno doesn't do that," but the distinction is getting smaller. Strip club ads used to be one of those things, but no more.

Visiting my daughter at college in Las Vegas and being treated to huge billboards with buttocks hanging out of thongs was one of those cringe inducing experiences. How can any reasonable human possibly be OK with that? Don't give me a lecture about the beauty of the human form and how sexuality is not shameful. I'm not going to discuss my personal life with you, but let me assure you that my opinion is not about shame. It's about appropriateness. Would you clip your nails at the dinner table, or discuss your finances with a department store clerk or have your postman make discipline decisions for your kids? Of course not. It's not appropriate. Plus, the fact that the body is beautiful, sacred and made by God is the very reason that your buttocks, or mine, should not be on display for everyone to see. Do we all remember the Biblical warning not to cast pearls before swine, and what that means?

Remember when The Men's Club opened downtown, and to appease those who opposed it, they promised that the words "girl" or "girls" would never be used in their ads? How long did that last? (Does anyone even remember that there was opposition?)

I'd rather live without these services nearby, but since that's unlikely, can we please have some decorum?

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There's a reason for the old adage, "Know your audience." It's applicable in politics, advertising, dinner table conversation – just about any situation you can imagine. Frequently I find that people are neglecting to consider their audience when speaking to me about recreational marijuana legalization. They invariably say, "It's no different than alcohol," leaving me having to remind them, "You do remember that I don't drink?"

By "don't drink," I mean never have. At age 12, I joined (without my parents, but with their consent) a religion that forbids alcohol. I went through my teen years without feeling a need to question that wisdom or push those boundaries. I cannot imagine a circumstance occurring in my adult years that would make me change my mind.

The number of people who say to me, "Not even wine?" staggers me - like I'll say, "Oh, of course I have WINE! I'm not a zealot!" I once truly offended a relative. We were eating dinner at her house, and she was splashing wine into the gravy. I asked if she could possibly set some aside without wine. She glared at me – she considers advising the cook to be a capital offense anyway – and snapped, "All the alcohol burns off in cooking. You can't even taste it." She was not prepared for my response, but she should have seen it coming: "If you can't even taste it, why put it in?" Whether you find alcohol to be unacceptable morally, like me, or are a recovering addict, like many of my friends, no alcohol means no alcohol.

For the record, even though I eat meat, I provide vegetarian entrees when I host vegetarians. When my son invited a Muslim classmate to his birthday party during Ramadan, I waited until after sunset to serve the (cheese) pizza. It's just common courtesy.

I did not grow up on a sheltered commune somewhere. I was born in Reno; I graduated from Reed High in Sparks. I've spent my life the same places everyone around me has. I just never indulged.

I'm not the only one. I can introduce you to dozens of people, older, younger and the same age as myself, with similar stories. A thirty-something friend just posted on his Facebook page, " So I was standing in a circle of 7-8 guys today and discovered that I was the only one in the group who had never done crystal meth, cocaine, heroin, hash, mushrooms, Ecstasy, marijuana, OxyContin, alcohol or cigarettes."

So, clearly, I am not your target audience for discussions of how marijuana is equal to alcohol – or nicotine or anything else legal.

Occasionally, I actually have to trot out statistics on alcohol related disease, crime, auto accidents and the like before people will concede that I may have a valid point. Let's not even discuss stupid, cringeworthy, wish-it-never happened moments and the societal costs of drinking.

The same goes for smoking. Do I honestly have to point out the disease quotient of smoking, the toll it takes on health and wellbeing? Please tell me I don't, that it's all understood. Telling me it will be "regulated" isn't a big plus. Alcohol and tobacco are regulated.

I have to resort to sarcasm when someone says, "tax revenue." Oh, there's MONEY to be made? Why didn't you say so? You know what else makes lots of money? Child porn! Heroin! We gotta jump on those opportunities! There's a world of unexplored possibilities!

Now, here's my dilemma. Even the history impaired should be aware of the violence and corruption of the Prohibition era. Humans don't handle being told "no" very well. Oh, what to do?