discovered a vial of marijuana in his backpack. I met Instead I started smoking pot. with his teacher, who said: “It’s normal. Most kids When I was twelve I was smoking try it.’’ Nic said that it was a mistake -- he had been pot every day -- sneaking off into influenced by a couple of thuggish boys at his new the bushes during recess. And that school -- and he promised that he would not use it pretty much continued through my time again. In his early teens, Nic was into the hippest in high school. music and then grew bored with it. By the time his favorite artists from Guns N’ Roses to Beck to Eminem had a hit record, Nic had discarded them in favor of the obscure, the ultra contemporary or plain bizarre,
11 | 12
Throughout his youth, I talked to Nic early and I woke up with almost no memory often about drugs in ways now prescribed by the of what I’d done. My excuse for Partnership for a Drug-Free America. I watched for the vomit everywhere was food poi one organization’s early warning signs of teenage soning. It scared me, honestly, alcoholism and drug abuse. (No. 15: “Does your child and I didn’t drink again like that volunteer to clean up after adult cocktail parties, but for a long time. neglect other chores?’’) Indeed, when he was 12, I