Sensi Magazine Colorado - Spring 2022

C O LO R A D O SPRING 2022

SMOKIN’

RACIAL

RECOVERY Can psychedelics ease

TUNES

OFFICIAL

SPRING FORWARD

Drop into our 4/20 playlist

transgenerational trauma?

MESS

The latest in cannabis culture and style

The government grows really bad weed DENVER’S DOPEST HOUSE

G rowers Boutique COMMERCIAL

with a

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R O S I N /C O 2 O I L

SY R U P

ROSIN

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COLORADO SENSI MAGAZINE SPRING 2022

sensimediagroup @sensimagazine @sensimag

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FEATURES

30

Reclaiming Recovery

40

Holding Science Hostage

Psychedelic therapy could help ease the deep wounds of racial trauma, but the stigma and the movement’s unbearable whiteness keep people away.

The federal government is the worst cannabis grower in the world—and it’s bringing the scientific community down.

PHOTO BY MEPHISTOPUCK VIA WIKIMEDIA COMMONS

DEPARTMENTS

13 EDITOR’S NOTE 24 THE LIFE Contributing to your health and happiness 16 THE BUZZ DENVER’S DOPEST News, tips, and tidbits to keep you in the loop IT’S CRAFTY Danish designer Peter Monrad brings a global perspective to craft beer branding.

HAPPY CLAM Learn the definition of quim.

HIGH FIVE A fistful of stuff we love GREEN THUMB Grow cannabis in your garden this spring.

ORDERED HERB The feng shui of marijuana OPENING THE GARDENS

Elitch gets going.

IMMERSIVE FRIDA A

special art happening hits Denver.

NEW CURRENCY The canna-crypto age has arrived.

MANSION The stately

birthplace of legal weed is now the spot to celebrate cannabis culture.

48 THE SCENE Hot happenings and hip

hangouts around town THE 4/20 PLAYLIST Tune in. Turn it up. Drop into our selection that celebrates the herb that goes hand-in-hand with great music.

ON THE COVER

The Marijuana Mansion is the place to get lit.

See page 24.

PHOTO COURTESY JACQUELINE COLLINS

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EXECUTIVE

MEDIA SALES

Ron Kolb Founder ron@sensimag.com Stephanie Graziano CEO stephanie.graziano@sensimag.com

CALIFORNIA Nancy Birnbaum Media Sales Exec.

Omowunmi Lykins Media Sales Exec.

ADVERTISING

Toni Tardif National Sales Director Jade Kolb Director Sales Operations and Global Recruiting PUBLISHING

COLORADO Nancy Seidel Media Sales Executive Amy Sharp Media Sales Executive Tyler Tarr Media Sales Executive FLORIDA Anthony Mckenzie Media Sales Exec.

MASSACHUSETTS Jake Boynton Media Sales Exec.

Nancy Reid Market Director, Florida

MICHIGAN Eric Lutey Media Sales Executive Kyle Miller Media Sales Executive Will Oostendorp Media Sales Exec.

Leah Stephens Media Sales Exec.

EDITORIAL

OKLAHOMA Diana Ramos Media Sales Executive

Jamie Cooper Market Director, Michigan Richard Guerra Market Director, Massachusetts

Stephanie Wilson Co-Founder + Editor in Chief stephanie.wilson@sensimag.com Doug Schnitzspahn Executive Editor Tracy Ross Managing Editor, Michigan Debbie Hall Managing Editor, Spark Jenny Willden Managing Editor, California Will Brendza Managing Editor, Colorado Radha Marcum Copy Editor Bevin Wallace Copy Editor DESIGN

Jamie Ezra Mark Creative Director jamie@emagency.com Rheya Tanner Art Director Wendy Mak Designer Josh Clark Designer Miguel Martinez Designer PRODUCTION

Neil Willis Production Director Richard Guerra Digital Production

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COLORADO Colorado Cannabis Company THC Coffee Concentrate Supply Co. Recreational Concentrates Higher Grade Boutique Cannabis Lab Society Extraction Expert + Lab Supplies marQaha Sublinguals + Beverages Monte Fiore Farms Recreational Cultivation Source CO Wholesale Consulting Terrapin Care Station Recreational Dispensary Uleva Hemp Products Witlon Inc. Payroll Processing

MICHIGAN Aronoff Law (Craig Aronoff) Licensing Law Firm Cannabis Counsel Cannabis Law Firm Etz Chaim Attestations Grapp Lerash Accounting/CPA Services Great Lakes Natural Remedies Lakeshore: Provisioning Center Kush Design Studio Cannabis Facility Design & Build MRB Solutions Human Resources Northern Specialty Health Upper Peninsula: Provisioning Center Pure West Compassion Club Caregiver Connection & Network Rair Medical Flower Solutions by Dr. Dave West Michigan: Hemp CBD Helping Friendly Hemp Company Hemp Topicals MASSACHUSETTS Corners Packaging Packaging Green Goddess Supply Personal Homegrown Biochamber The Holistic Center Medical Marijuana Evaluations Revolutionary Clinics Medical Dispensary Royal Gold Soil Tess Woods Public Relations Public Relations Vantage Builders Construction CALIFORNIA 365 Recreational Cannabis Dispensary: Recreational, Santa Rosa Red Door Remedies Dispensary: Cloverdale Southern Humboldt Royal Cannabis Company Mixed Light Farming Uleva Hemp Products Vaper Tip Vape Supply & Consulting Witlon Payroll

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O

EDITOR’S NOTE

Magazine published monthly

by Sensi Media Group LLC.

© 2022 Sensi Media Group. All rights reserved.

Our spring A-list issue

is brimming with faces of

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FAC E B O O K Like Sensi Media Group to infuse your newsfeed with more of our great cannabis lifestyle content.

TWITTER Follow @sensimag for need-to-know news and views from Sensi headquarters.

people who are driving the cannabis industry forward. This season, we celebrate them—the innovators, the trailblazers, the humans at the heart of this all.

Over the six years Sensi has been exploring and reporting on cannabis (in addition to all its adjacent lifestyle topics), we have collectively widened the scope of how we define, think about, and experience the modern cannabis lifestyle. It has never been more mainstream or had more potential: our culture has started treating the plant, the people who consume it, and the industry it powers with an importance that’s long overdue.

Of course, more cannabis news out there means more work for us here at Sensi.

We are working overtime on our mission to help you navigate all its highs, lows, and inevitable challenges.

We—the collective—didn’t get to collectively experience 4/20/2020 or the monthlong 4/20 that surrounded it, something that we had been looking forward to ever since someone had the high thought that in April 2020, it would be 4/20 all month long. We were hoping to make up for it in April 2021, when Sensi celebrated its fifth anniversary, but alas, the world had different plans for us all.

This year, Sensi is turning six and we’re celebrating as if we’re turning four in the middle of a month of 4/20s—and we’re doing it five times. Literally. In Colorado, we’re going back to our roots in the place where we started by celebrating the luminaries at the forefront of the cannabis industry, the pioneers who are pushing the conversation forward.

We’re celebrating where we’ve been, where we are, and where we’re heading. Sensi Nights are being held coast to coast, California to Massachusetts, Michigan to Florida, and setting up shop in new markets in between. We invite you to take this journey with us through the pages of this magazine and online where you can read every edition of Sensi we’re publishing this spring: Colorado, California, Massachusetts, Michigan, Florida, Oklahoma, and Puerto Rico.

We’re celebrating where we’ve been, where we are, and where we’re heading.

I N S TAG R A M Pretty things, pretty places, pretty awesome people: find it all on @sensimagazine

Steph Wilson @stephwilll

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Danish designer Peter Monrad brings a global perspective to the truly global phenomenon that is craft beer branding in his latest book.

Craft breweries spring up like mushrooms around the globe, and it can be hard to stand out in an already-crowded market. Pioneering brewmasters and microbreweries are finding new ways to create unique brands that stand out, using cans and bottle labels to define their ethos and identity. Pushing the boundaries of graphic design and illustration, they draw from the full riches of graphic language to lead the way in modern packaging design. From the minimalist to the expressionist, using lines, colors, patterns, and illustrations, all styles are allowed—which makes for an exciting, exuberant visual 16

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culture. Peter Monrad’s book Craft Beer Design showcases a curated collection of the best and most out-there designs from around the world, ultimately leaving the reader with the feeling that, when it comes to craft beer, what’s on the can can matter as much as what’s in it.

The book is a bit of a preview of the future of cannabis branding as the industry continues to mature and balloon with each new state that opts out of prohibition and into legal adult sales. Market research firm BDSA predicts that the legal U.S. cannabis market will reach $47.6 billion in annual

sales by 2026, surpassing the craft beer industry.

Craft beer and craft cannabis have a lot in common: they’re artisan products geared toward the same demographic of consumer that is driven by taste, product quality, and consumer experience.

For a brand to succeed, it not only has to have outstanding quality products, it’s got to stand out in a crowded marketplace, and we can look to the innovative design tactics employed by craft beer brands to get a glimpse of what’s in store for craft cannabis.

Craft Beer Design by Peter Monrad for Gestalten ($40).

PHOTOS (FROM TOP) COURTESY GESTALTEN; DESIGN BALTER AND LACHIE GOLDSWORTHY, PHOTO BEN TRUEMAN

Brewing Something New

HAPPY CLAM Something I learned today: the word quim is Old English slang for the female anatomy. It’s also the name of the California-based self-care brand of sexual wellness products “for humans with vaginas and humans without vaginas who love vaginas.” Quim’s mission is to break the taboos associated with sex, cannabis, and vaginal health, and it is doing so with a collection of high-quality, plant-based pleasure oils and serums that meet your intimate needs while fostering proactive self-care rituals that support vaginal health and relaxation.

Happy Clam ($48) is an everyday oil designed to “keep your quim happy, healthy, and moisturized.”

The official product description suggests you “think of it like eye cream for your vagina.” It’s made with tea tree oil (mother nature’s antiseptic—UTIs be gone!), damiana (natural aphrodisiac that’s been around since the Mayans), and full-spectrum hemp CBD among other plant-based ingredients. Happy customers report an increase in sexual arousal and stamina, more frequent orgasms, and reduced vaginal dryness. The brand suggests you apply after bathing, before bed, after sex, when PMSing or menstrautaing, or “anytime your quim is in need of some tender loving care.” itsquim.com

BY THE NUMBERS

107,059

High 5

Here’s what’s haute at the intersection of culture and cannabis right now.

How many new jobs the cannabis industry added in 2021—more than 280 every day

3x How many more cannabis workers there are in the US than dentists

428,059 The number of full-time-equivalent jobs that are now supported by cannabis in this country, as of January 2022 SOURCE: 2022 Leafly Jobs Report

1. Hervé Macarons Inspired by the classic art of French pâtisserie creation, Hervé produces exquisite macarons that combine contemporary design with delicious flavors in this iteration of the treat that has been around since the 1500s. Available in California.

2. Vibes Basketball Get in the game with this rock from Vibes, the premium rolling paper brand by rapper and serial entrepreneur Berner of Cookies.

3. Session Goods Protected Pipes Made of thick, tinted borosilicate glass, this handheld piece comes with a custom-designed silicone sleeve that protects your pipe from breaking and your bag from ash while you’re out in the world.

4. Jeeter x Highsman Sweatshirt The cannabis pre-roll brand teamed up with NFL running back Ricky Williams’ cannabis lifestyle brand for an apparel line that benefits Athletes for CARE. 5. Alive & Kicking Ashtray Stay alive by kicking that cigarette habit— that’s the message behind this decor piece from the company behind the slim hemp pre-rolls that are free from THC and nicotine.

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THE BUZZ

THE FENG SHUI OF CANNABIS Interior designer and feng shui master Jami Lin can’t grow hemp plants at her home in Florida. If she could, she would place them in her home’s southeastern and eastern corners, where, according to feng shui’s five elements theory, the wood element resides. Plants are wood elements, so they feel comfortable and thrive there.

Lin says you can also place cannabis plants, with intention, in the southeastern or eastern part Follow this simple guide to growing cannabis in of individual rooms. In the bedroom, they would your garden this year. grow opportunities for deepening relationships; in Growing cannabis takes knowledge, time, and attention, but anythe home office, professional and financial opportuone with good intentions can do it, says Susan Sheldon, a landscape architect and master gardener in Amherst, Massachusetts. She had nities; in the zen den/meditation room, subliminal and conscious head spaces. no idea how to grow it when she first got started, but she learned online and now has cannabis sprinkled among the hyssop, borage, basil, chamomile, and mountain mint in her herb garden full of QUICK HIT native pollinators. We asked her to share some tips to help anyone who wants to give it a try themselves.

Obey laws. Local regulations vary state by state, county by county, town by town. Make sure your space complies with the rules of the land.

Be discreet. Hide cannabis among other plants or structures. It’s still federally illegal and could invite thieves.

Plant a diverse ecosystem. If possible, plant cannabis among beneficial companion plants (a quick Google search can point you in the right direction) with good light penetration and air flow.

Give plants space. Cannabis plants each need at least 2.5 to 3 square feet. The more space you give the roots, the larger your plant will grow.

Feed them. Go online or visit a grow store to find the best nutrients for your plants. Don’t be stingy, but don’t overfeed them either.

Water as needed. Let plants dry out between watering, then thoroughly saturate them. If plants are in pots, place the pot in a tub of The inventor of Viagra introduces water and let it drink from the bottom up. If pots are in trays, don’t a cannabis-enhanced sexuallet them sit in water. enhancement serum for women.

Practice garden sanitation. Remove diseased plants or plant pieces One of the developers of Viagra co-inventimmediately. Clean pruning shears with rubbing alcohol between snips. ed Vella Women’s Pleasure Serum ($65), Beware of mold. Plants in damp climates are most susceptible, but which uses nanoencapsulated CBD to mold can happen anywhere. Check plants daily if not twice daily. In relax vaginal and clitoral muscle tissue and the late season before harvest, shake off dew and fan the plants. deliver more intense orgasms. Apply 15 Kill powdery mildew. PM Remover, a spray made from potassium minutes before having sex. bicarbonate, lactose, and garlic powder, does the trick. vellabio.com

PHOTOS (FROM TOP) BY AAPSKY VIA ADOBE STOCK; COURTESY VELLA

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THE BUZZ

Opening the Gardens

The snow is melting, the days are getting longer, the birds are back, and trees are budding. You know what that means? It’s Elitch Gardens season. The wild rides, features, games, and events will come to life when the park opens on April 30. Finally, after a long winter, you can get your roller coaster kicks on Mr. Twister, experience the terrifying sensation of freefall on the Tower of Doom, or win prizes at the numerous game stalls. Add an edible into the mix, and you’re bound to have an exciting day.

PHOTOS (CLOCKWISE FROM LEFT) COURTESY IMMERSIVE FRIDA KAHLO; COURTESY ELITCH GARDENS; BY ANTTONIART VIA ADOBE STOCK

elitchgardens.com

Frida Kahlo Comes to Denver Famous for her many self portraits, all dealing with the human form, personal identity, and death, Frida Kahlo was a visionary painter. Many connoisseurs of the time saw her art as being surrealist in style. Kahlo denied that characterization, but regardless, the Frida Immersive Dream art exhibit, which will be in Denver through April, is sure to be a surreal experience. The bright colors, fantasy scenes, and icons of Indigenous Mexican culture that define Kahlo’s artwork will come to life in this interactive, immersive art exhibit. Produced by the same group that brought Denver the popular Van Gogh immersive experience, this visual exhibition includes 500,000 cubic feet of art, 90,000,000 pixels, and 1,200,000 frames of video. It’s a journey through the life and art of Frida Kahlo, from pain and hardship to triumph and success.

DAWN OF THE CANNA-CRYPTO AGE

It was only a matter of time before the cannabis industry and the cryptocurrency movement collided—and of course it’s happening here in Denver. Both communities are full of entrepreneurs—and young business people willing to take risks—looking for that next big thing. There have been a few crypto-coins minted specifically for cannabis transactions—PotCoin (POT), HempCoin (THC), DopeCoin (DOPE), and CannabisCoin (CANN)—but none of them really took off.

Now, however, with the introduction of NFTs, a whole new world of green opportunity has opened up. Neil Demers, the CEO of Frost Exotic Cannabis, is pioneering a leap into this space; soon the immersive art dispensary will be offering customer discounts for NFT ownership and will accept cryptocurrencies as payment. Down the road it may even start offering its own NFTs, which could be used, exchanged, and “played” within a virtual game-based setting, where players could crossbreed virtual plant genes and create new virtual strains with different virtual effects. The possibilities are endless (and they somehow make more sense when you’re high).

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PHOTO COURTESY OF MARIJUANA MANSION

Moroccan Room of Marijuana Mansion

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Denver’s Dopest Mansion The birthplace of legal weed is now a place to celebrate cannabis culture—and take amazing photos while you’re doing it.

TEXT WILL BRENDZA

PHOTOS (FROM TOP) COURTESY OF JACQUELINE COLLINS; COURTESY MARIJUANA MANSION

Downtown Denver has changed at an insane pace over the last 133 years. Looking at the city back then, you’d hardly recognize the sparse Western outpost compared to the bustling, skyscraper-skylined Mile High City it is today.

But through all of that change, one unique

building has remained virtually unaltered. One building has stood resolutely as the city grew and evolved all around it. It’s been home to Denver aristocrats, became a pivotal headquarters for cannabis legalization, and now serves the city as an experiential cannabis consumption event space:

the Marijuana Mansion.

Built in 1889 for a prominent Denver businessman and designed by the esteemed Denver architect John J. Huddart, the mansion was first known as the “Creswell House.” But Joseph Creswell, who commissioned the building, never could have imagined what kind of history was in store for his distinguished Romanesque-revival and Queen Anne–inspired residence.

Creswell died in 1926, but his mansion didn’t go anywhere. It stood like a sandstone monument amid a city in flux. Just down the street from the State Capitol, the building wasn’t far from some of Denver’s biggest political events, protests, and changes over the years.

Including in 2012, when the mansion earned its

name, serving as ground zero for the legalization of cannabis. It became the Colorado headquarters for the Marijuana Policy Project, which was responsible for creating the legalization laws for Colorado in 2012—making it the birthplace of the nation’s first recreational marijuana bill.

Now, however, the Marijuana Mansion’s taken on a new persona—no longer a home, or a political office, the historic building has become an Instagram-friendly event and consumption space, like a miniature marijuana-themed Meow Wolf.

Every single room is artistically designed to be an immersive experience: the historical room is furnished to look just like the original chambers from the early 1900’s; the “green room” is decorated to reflect 1960’s rock

TOP: Step into Wonderland in the Ellie Paisley Artist Room.

BOTTOM: Behold the original home of legal weed.

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THE LIFE

MORE INFO

PHOTOS COURTESY OF JACQUELINE COLLINS

Marijuana Mansion mjmansion.com @MJMansion

‘n’ roll counterculture music; the “weed room” features a throne and a swing with walls covered in pot leaves; and the “Mary Jane in marijuana wonderland” room is ... well, you can probably picture it.

The mansion is available to rent for private events—business parties, birthdays, or receptions— or for individual tours and photoshoots. But it also hosts its own events like the Chronic High on Heelz Drag Show, or the Namaste High Yoga Class, where attendees can consume cannabis before, during, and after the event. (Notably, the mansion doesn’t sell can-

nabis, and operates under a strict BYO policy—and conveniently it shares a parking lot with Green Dragon dispensary.)

But consider yourself warned: this mansion has a semi-famous reputation for being haunted by the ghosts of past residents.

Since the days when Creswell lived here with his family, there have been strange encounters, sights, sounds, and supernatural apparitions.

Often, people report the sensation of having someone creeping up behind them while inside the building— only to turn and find no one there. There have even been reports of

mysterious, unidentified women staring woefully out the top windows toward the mountains in the west. The mansion’s history is so supernaturally charged, it was featured in the book, The Haunted Heart of Denver.

In short, whether you’re

looking for a unique and photogenic spot for a smoke sesh with friends, an event space where everyone can spark up and get blazed together under a single roof, or a highly entertaining tour of a haunted house, the Marijuana Mansion will feel like home.

TOP: Get a touch of 19th-century class in the Victorian Era Room BOTTOM: Owner Lisa Leder chillls out in the Weed Room.

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Psychedelic therapy could help ease the deep, constant wounds of racial trauma, but the stigma and the movement’s unbearable whiteness keep people away. TEXT ROBYN GRIGGS LAWRENCE

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THE ROAD TO

ORIGINAL PHOTO BY BEN SCOTT, UNSPLASH

RECLAIMING RECOVERY

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PHOTO COURTESY OF THE ANCESTOR PROJECT

n her vision, NiCole Buchanan is lying on a mat on a dirt floor, watching the woman sitting across from her morph into her ancestors through multiple generations, women she recognizes as legacies of her own history. They tell her they have survived brutal lifetimes as Black women so that she could be. They tell her she’s doing everything they’d hoped and dreamed.

In Jamilah George’s vision, she’s riding a lapa (an African skirt) like a magic carpet, looking down at her ancestors working the plantation fields. A face that looks like hers turns toward her and reaches out a hand, and George pulls her up to the lapa. As generations of her ancestors pass by below, she continues to reach down and pull them up until her lapa is full of beautiful Black women from her lineage, all holding hands. “I’ve never felt so much warmth and support in my life, ever,” she says.

Buchanan, an associate professor of psychology at Michigan State University and founder of Alliance Psychological Associates in East Lansing, Michigan, and George, a Detroit native who is studying the potential of psychedelic medicine to heal the psychological effects of racial trauma while pursuing a PhD in clinical psychology at the University of Connecticut, shared their psychedelic experiences during an emotional segment of “Black Lives Matter & Psychedelic Integration: Pathways to Radical Healing Amidst Ongoing Oppression.” The webinar, sponsored by the Chacruna Institute (a nonprofit that provides education about psychedelic plant medicines) in

November, is one of many such events that have come online recently to explore how entheogens (plants that inspire non-ordinary states of consciousness and spiritual enlightenment) may be able to uproot and heal deep, embedded scars from generations of systemic racial oppression.

Oyi Sun, an Atlanta-based martial arts master and coach who produced the 2020 Detroit Psychedelic Conference, explains it this way: “The white man has been selling trauma for generations, and here’s the terrible part—we’ve been programmed to receive it. And when you’re dealing with earthly trauma, entheogens are the best therapists in the world. There’s been a spiritual suppression going on for over 2,000 years, and now with the help of entheogens, there’s about to be a renewal of spiritual power.”

Sun stepped in to run the conference, with the theme “Entheogenics in Urban Environments: A Journey into the Mysteries,” after its founder, Baba Kilindi Iyi, died in April. Kilindi, one of the world’s foremost experts on psychedelic science and healing and the master of mushroom megadosing, was often the only Black presenter—if not the only Black person—at conferences and events on the psychedelic circuit, and he created the Detroit conference to bring the conversation home. “The faces that look like Kilindi—the brown faces—have not been represented in the entheogenic community,” Sun says.

The conference took place at the Bushnell Congregational Church, a prewar Colonial Revival building on four acres in Rosedale Park, over a long weekend in August. Diverse speakers from around the world S P R I N G 2022

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shared their expertise on everything from subatomic particle research and hyperdimensional realms to psychedelic justice, culminating in a memorial for Kilindi that Sun describes as “four hours of emotions, laughter, speakers, heart pouring, drumming—and more drumming and more drumming and more dancing and martial arts exhibitions.” It was a template for future events, Sun says, and they’re already brewing in Oakland, Denver, and Portland, Oregon (where voters recently legalized psilocybin for therapeutic use and decriminalized possession of all drugs).

a scab keeps getting ripped off a wound, the wound can never heal.

“If someone is assaulted, for most of us, that happens once, then you have some time to heal,” says Undrea Wright, who co-founded The Sabina Project (since renamed The Ancestor Project) last year to provide Black-led psychedelic education, training, and harm reduction. “For people of color, we don’t have any time to heal because when we come out of ceremony, reality is still there.”

Psychedelic therapy, one of the hottest healing modalities to emerge in decades, shows a lot of promise in treating PTSD, and many see its

of Psychology at the University of Ottawa, has found psychedelics to be highly effective at treating racial trauma. She is the clinical director of the Behavioral Wellness Clinic in Tolland, Connecticut, where she and her colleagues offer culturally informed ketamine-assisted psychotherapy as a means of treating racial trauma. They find that many Black people refuse to even consider it, because they can be “fearful of a psychedelic medicine and the vulnerability that comes with it,” Williams explained during a Chacruna Institute forum on diversity in psychedelic medicine in February 2020.

PSYCHEDELICS AND RACIAL TRAUMA Racial trauma is a lot like PTSD— with symptoms like nightmares and hypervigilance—and it develops over a lifetime of injustices and abuses. But racial trauma is more insidious than PTSD because people of color continue to experience the same threats and humiliation that triggered them in the first place on an ongoing basis. When 34

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potential for treating racial trauma as well. “Right now, what’s taking up all the space for Indigenous and Black people is trauma, and the opposite of trauma is creative,” Sun says. “When entheogens come in and start clearing up that trauma, there’s going to be a void, and that void will be filled with creativity.”

Monnica T. Williams, PhD, an associate professor in the School

In 2018, Williams and three colleagues published their findings from a methodological search of psychedelic studies from 1993 to 2017. In those studies, 82.3 percent of the participants were non-Hispanic white, 4.6 percent were Indigenous, 2.5 percent were African American, 2.1 percent were Latino, and 1.8 percent were Asian.

Selection bias is a factor in this,

PHOTO COURTESY OF THE ANCESTOR PROJECT

The Pygmy tribes of Central Africa discovered the psychedelic properties of ibogaine, an indole alkaloid extracted from a rainforest shrub called Tabernanthe iboga, thousands of years ago and shared it with people who practice the Bwiti religion in West Africa. Still used as sacred medicine in Cameroon and Gabon, ibogaine opens doors to mystical experiences and communion with ancestors and spirits, often taking people on dreamlike journeys through their lives and offering transformative perspectives.

Ibogaine is being studied as a treatment for drug addiction (opioids in particular), and clinics offer ibogaine-assisted detoxification in Mexico, Canada, Costa Rica, the Netherlands, South Africa, and New Zealand. In the United States, ibogaine is a Schedule 1 narcotic.

PHOTO COURTESY OF THE ANCESTOR PROJECT

certainly, but just as importantly, many people of color have little trust for medical trials (one word: Tuskegee) and illicit substances (two words: Drug War). They’ve been exploited and abused within the medical system and targeted in an immoral war that has decimated communities. Many don’t have the expendable time and money it takes to participate in clinical trials.

George was one of few Black participants in clinical trials for MDMA-assisted psychotherapy to treat PTSD that were sponsored by the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS), and it was anything but a healing experience for her. (MDMA is an acronym for the synthetic drug 3,4-methylenedioxy-methamphetamine, more commonly known as Ecstasy and Molly.) After her session with two white therapists, she was sent home with a white night attendant, but she continued to feel alone and terrified. “I remember feeling so lost, so out of touch with my body, and psychologically, I didn’t have control of my thoughts,” she said during the webinar. “I was scared to call anyone. How do I tell any of my Black friends I just did an MDMA study?”

“THESE MEDICINES ARE PART OF OUR CULTURAL BIRTHRIGHT, AND I BELIEVE WE LOSE MORE WHEN WE STEP BACK AND CHOOSE NOT TO ENGAGE.” —Monnica T. Williams, PhD, University of Ottowa’s School of Psychology

RECLAIMING PSYCHEDELIC HEALING Beyond the clinic, underground psychedelic experiences like ayahuasca circles have become a thing in communities across North America—and every one of those circles is overwhelmingly white, says Wright. The few people of color who do participate, he says, find it uncomfortable because white people often (wittingly or unwittingly) gaslight them. “If I’m in a space that’s supposed to be safe and available to my story, and people S P R I N G 2022

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are telling me my story is not real or valuable, that I just need to move past it, now I have an additional layer of trauma,” he says. “This is the story we kept hearing over and over.

People of color had the wherewithal and learned about the medicines, finally found the circle—which is cost-prohibitive for most of us— then they had to do this dance in the circle. It can be retraumatizing.”

Wright and Charlotte James co-founded The Ancestor Project because they recognized “how healing it would be to be able to share our experiences and extend access to these medicines with our own communities, especially during these incredibly challenging and isolating times,” James says. People have been flocking to their workshops, trainings, and virtual ceremonies throughout the pandemic, seeking both community and information as they confront the demons of isolation.

“WE JUST WANT TO GUARANTEE THERE IS SOME SAFE, JUDGMENTFREE SPACE TO PROCESS JOURNEYS.” —Undrea Wright, Co-founder of The Ancestor Project

The Ancestor Project’s ceremonies are open to everyone, but integration circles are only for people of color. “We just want to guarantee there is some safe, judgment-free space, free of the white gaze, to process journeys,” she says. Fearing a judicial system that’s stacked against them, Wright and James facilitate only ceremonies with substances that are legal in the United States. Citing an ACLU study in Maryland that found African American men 900 percent more likely to be arrested for simple possession than white men, Wright says, “The consequences for us to do anything illegal are severe.”

Those consequences are why many Black parents warn their children away from all drugs, psychedelics included. Buchanan said during the webinar that when she was growing up, everyone knew the story of her father’s best friend Lonnie, who tried acid after he returned from Vietnam and went crazy. “Every Black community has one of these stories,” she says.

“What’s crazy,” Wright says, “is that most of these [sacred earth medicine] practices come from people of color. They convinced us to denounce these very powerful tools and replace them with pharmaceutical drugs that are killing us.”

“These medicines are part of our cultural birthright,” Williams said in her lecture last February. “And I believe we lose more when we step back and choose not to engage.

It is true that it has not always been safe for us, but I hope we can come together as a people, create our own safe spaces, and become empowered to reclaim psychedelic healing for ourselves, our loved ones, and our community.”

DOING THE MOST GOOD Support The Ancestor Project by donating to its Mutual Ceremony Fund, which provides monetary assistance for BIPOC looking to explore psychedelic healing work through The Ancestor Project’s workshops. the ancestorproject.com

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P R O M O T I O N A L F E AT U R E NCRMA

Risky Business The National Cannabis Risk Management Association (NCRMA) is here for businesses looking to assess—and mitigate—risks that threaten their success in this ever-changing market.

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n business, as in life, the biggest risk you run is not knowing what you don’t know. That’s why risk management is an integral part of any successful business’s operational plans—even more so in the emerging cannabis industry.

The reality is that running a business—let alone a cannabis business—comes with a lot of complexities, and a lot of pitfalls that could derail your business goals. That’s why

it’s imperative to not only have practices and policies in place to mitigate those risks, but also to be prepared to minimize the impacts should they become reality. But for new business owners—which by some estimates more than 60 percent of cannabis entrepreneurs are—it can be difficult to even know where to begin.

This is where the National Cannabis Risk Management Association (NCRMA) trade organization comes in. The nation’s

only dedicated cannabis risk management association, NCRMA has put together a disruptively innovative risk management platform for the cannabis industry, supplemented by an insurance platform that offers businesses committed to the risk management process access to lower-cost coverage designed for this nontraditional industry.

The platform includes robust risk assessment and consulting services through the National Cannabis Risk Prevention Services (NCRPS); the NCRM Academy, a virtual educational platform where NCRMA members can access discounted courses, webinars, and customized trainings; and exclusive access to insurance products designed for cannabis businesses through Trichome innovative Risk Protection TM Insurance. Together, these benefits offer NCRMA members tools, procedures, knowledge, and support.

“We first created NCRMA about four years ago because we recognized that emerging markets and industries like cannabis require fundamentally sound risk management in order to be successful,” says Rocco Petrilli, chairman of NCRMA. “Growth in cannabis is not guaranteed, and one of the major derailers is the weak states of risk management and insurance, which threaten the industry’s ability to reach its projected potential. But with the right solutions, these threats can be mitigated and overcome.”

This is the first of a three-part series discussing risk management in the cannabis industry with NCRMA. To read the entire series, visit sensimag.com

NCRMA Risk Management Company ncrma.net S P R I N G 2022

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The federal government is the worst cannabis grower in the world—and it’s bringing the scientific community down.

TEXT WILL BRENDZA

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PHOTO EDITS BY JOSH CLARK

HO L D I NG SC I E NCE HO S T A GE

T

he grow room extends like a jungle in all directions.

Fans hum, and the smell of flowering cannabis is pleasantly overwhelming. Jason MacDonald, the director of cultivation operations at Native Roots Colorado dispensary and producer, explains that this massive forested room is just one of twelve in its facility.

I try to wrap my head around that. I try to picture the scale, comparing it in my mind to the federally funded cannabis grow supplying all of the US’s labs with “research grade” marijuana. But there’s no comparison to be made—at least, not according to what researchers have told me.

“Go ahead and squeeze the bud gently, like this,” MacDonald says, tenderly pinching a fat nugget with gloved fingers. “You’ll get a really full aroma.”

I squeeze the nugget closest to me and inhale the residue. Fresh terpenes fill my nostrils: sharp, piney, aromatic dankness.

I’ve toured a fair share of grow operations—from closet homegrows to garage semi-pros, greenhouses, warehouses, and straightup houses—but I’ve never seen anything quite like the Native Roots “Mothership.” It’s 225,000 square feet of industrial cannabis mass-production, sprawling in some places, labyrinth-like in others, with different rooms and zones and extraction laboratories straight out of science fiction.

The operation grows some 65,000 plants at any given time, yielding

thousands of pounds of cannabis every month. The strains range in THC content from 13 percent to 30 percent, and the Mothership extracts its own oil, shatter, wax, live resin, live bladder, and “sauce” on site—all in a massive unmarked building that you can smell from I-70.

It’s a machine. And within it, weed is being grown more scientifically, more efficiently, with better equipment, bigger budgets, and deeper knowledge than anything prior to legalization.

At the same time, scientific research on this Schedule 1 substance is being done with ditch weed from Mississippi. It’s the law: if researchers want to study cannabis, not only do they have to get federal approval first, they have to use samples provided by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA)—an agency with a reputation for growing infamously bad pot.

It’s so bad, it could be compromising all of science that’s been done on cannabis so far.

THE GOVERNMENT’S GROW Down in Mississippi, on a highly secured plot of land in an undisclosed location, there’s a marijuana grow that is owned and overseen by the Federal Government.

In 1968, the University of Mississippi received a contract to become the government’s sole provider of standardized scientific cannabis, and it has been ever since. Its 12-acre outdoor grow features a single 1,100-squarefoot indoor grow room. Under NIDAs supervision, the program has grown to meet exploding scientific demand for its “research grade” cannabis—but the demand

is starting to outpace the facility’s abilities. As a result, in May of 2021, the DEA announced that it was reviewing applications to create other authorized cannabis grows (threatening UM’s monopoly on America’s science weed).

However since that announcement almost a year ago, there has been no news from the DEA or NIDA—leaving scientists no alternative to NIDA’s plants. According to Daniela Vergara, a University of Colorado at Boulder researcher, that’s dangerous for our understanding of cannabis.

“Federally produced cannabis does not reflect the legal market,” Vergara says.

In 2017, she and a team of CU researchers set out to examine the quality of NIDA’s plants compared to the commercial market’s. They found that NIDA’s varieties have 77 percent lower THC levels than commercial cannabis and as much as 11–23 times the cannabinol (CBN) content.

“So [in 2021] we wanted to see the genomic evidence. Like, why [genetically] are they so different?” Vergara says.

The CU researchers took to the lab again. And this time, they were going straight to the source code: the bud’s DNA. “We found that the genome is very different from the strains on the available commercial markets,” Vergera says. “[NIDA’s strains] do not cluster with any other commercial strains. They cluster on their own. They’re more similar to each other than to any commercial strain.”

That means all of the scientific claims that have been made using NIDA’s varieties may not be valid, S P R I N G 2022

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according to Vergara, because it compromises the “external validity” of the research. And whether a person is pro-cannabis or anti-cannabis, that should be an obvious problem because scientists aren’t studying the same substance people are using.

PHOTO EDITS BY JOSH CLARK

RETURN TO THE MOTHERSHIP Upon entering the grow, Jason MacDonald and I don some dopey-looking sterile bodysuits and foot booties.

“To prevent guests from bringing contaminants into the grow,” he explains as we push through a heavy door and into the facility’s grow zone. Staff at the operation all take showers at the start of their day in locker rooms before putting on fresh clothes for the same purpose, he says. But they can’t ask every guest to do the same. So, bodysuits it is.

“Our integrated pest-management system uses the airflow moving from this side of the building to that side,” MacDonald says. “This being the ‘veg’ area [where plants start growing] where we’re most concerned about contaminants, and that side of the building being post-harvest.”

According to MacDonald, as long as he’s been at Native Roots, the grow operation has been an ever-evolving project. They’re constantly tweaking the system, upgrading equipment, streamlining their processes, refining extraction methods, and experimenting with new techniques.

“We’re always modifying. It’s never major modifications but small-scale experimentation,” MacDonald says. “We are always

Compared to commercial markets, The National Institute of Drug Abuse’s cannabis varieties have

77% LOWER

THC levels and as much as

23X the CBN content.

trying to get that one or two percent better.”

As if to prove his point, MacDonald points to some long boxes stacked against one wall of the hallway.

“This is brand new,” he says.

“We’re replacing all of our 1,000watt metal halide veg fixtures with 350-watt LEDs.” The LEDs use far less energy, he explains; they’ll reduce the grow’s HVAC energy use, and reduce bulb replacement costs and waste.

MacDonald adds that they’re also ramping up to install their very own cogeneration natural gas power system.

“It will generate all of our power on site,” MacDonald says. He explains that about 50 percent of power delivered by the grid is lost in transmission to the users—but by generating its own power the operation will be over 90 percent energy efficient. “Then we can take heat as the byproduct from this and pump it through the building.”

Next, he shows me the nutrient room, where the Mothership stores its in-house mixed fertilizer solutions in huge reservoirs—then the drying rooms, the decontamination room, and the extract laboratory. Over 200 employees work at the Mothership, growing, trimming, sorting, curing, and packaging some of the best cannabis in the state. There’s constant product testing and quality control along every step of the process.

“It’s a labor of love,” MacDonald says. “We’re all really passionate about what we do and we’re proud of it.”

By contrast, NIDA’s grow is overseen by government organizations complicit in the suppression and prohibition of the product.

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a hand crafted cannabis and herbal blended pre-roll www.dadirriextracts.com • @dadirri.extracts • #livedadirriously WARNING: Use of Marijuana Concentrate may lead to: 1. Psychotic symptoms and/or Psychotic disorder (delusions, hallucinations, or difficulty distinguishing reality); 2. Mental Health Symptoms/Problems; 3. Cannabis Hyperemesis Syndrome (CHS) (uncontrolled and repetitive vomiting); 4. Cannabis use disorder / dependence, including physical and psychological dependence.

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YourSourceCO.com

It’s missing the key ingredient that goes into growing any good weed: the power of love.

PHOTO BY ALEKSANDR RYBALKO VIA ADOBE STOCK

BRIDGING THE GAP Cannabis is not going anywhere in the US. States are ending prohibition one by one, multiple cannabis bills are bouncing around Congress, and hundreds of thousands of Americans are using it recreationally and medicinally every day.

And yet the science behind this plant is scant. Everyone touts it as a miracle drug to treat anxiety, sleeplessness, nausea, eating disorders, inflammation, even possibly COVID-19. But there isn’t a whole lot of science to back those anecdotal claims up—yet. And what research is out there might not be as accurate as we’d hope.

“As a scientist, they’re making me study this little fraction

“As a scientist, they’re making me study this little fraction of the [genetic] variation— like if I told you, ‘Yes, you can study dogs, but you can only study chihuahuas.’”

—Daniela Vergara, cannabis researcher, University of Colorado at Boulder

of the [genetic] variation—like if I told you, ‘Yes, you can study dogs, but you can only study chihuahuas,’” Vergara says. “That doesn’t make sense.”

MacDonald agrees. He says that he won’t allow any plant on his garden floor that’s under 12 percent THC content—the fact that NIDA’s cannabis is all below that low watermark is problematic for everyone.

“I really think it’s just giving the wrong information for scientific research,” MacDonald says.

We can blame NIDA for that. Or maybe blame the growers at UM. But the real culprit is the federal prohibition of cannabis. It’s the Schedule 1 status of this flower that is standing in the way of accurate science—information that could be saving lives if not for that federal roadblock.

A B O U T T H E AU T H O R

Will Brenzda is Sensi’s Colorado local editor. He worked as a cannabis reporter for Rooster and the Boulder Weekly, where he now serves as a news editor and reporter.

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Sensi’s 4/20 Playlist Tune in. Turn it up. Drop into our selection that celebrates the herb that goes handin-hand with great music.

As the voice of the Beat Generation, poet Ginsburg, once put it: “Marijuana is a useful catalyst for specific optical and aural aesthetic perceptions. I apprehended the structure of certain pieces of jazz and classical music in a new manner under the influence of marijuana, and these apprehensions have remained valid in years of normal consciousness.” With that in mind, we give you our annual 4/20 playlist, guaranteed to both up the vibe of the day and celebrate musicians who appreciate the plant.

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Snoop Dog Gin and Juice The modern poster child for cannabis as a recreational pleasure, a medicinal alternative, a symbol of counterculture, an F-you to racism, and an entrepreneurial goldmine, Snoop has never been apologetic about being himself and enjoying his smoke. His biggest song gives the finger to society unwilling to accept him and elevates partying to a social statement.

Essential Lyric: “Rollin’ down the street, smokin’ indo / Sippin’ on gin and juice, laid back”

The Beatles Got to Get You Into My Life

from Revolver is, according to Paul McCartney, a paean to the the green leaf.

Essential Lyric: “I didn’t know what I would find there / Another road where maybe I / Could see another kind of mind there”

The Fab Four is most associated with hallucinogenics—often credited with the cosmic shift of experimentation that gave us Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, which changed pop music forever—but marijuana first loosened them up. By all appearances a love song, this often overlooked gem

Bob Dylan Rainy Day Women #12 & 35 Sure everybody must get stoned but don’t fall for the obvious here. Yes, Dylan was talking about the favorite herb of the counterculture but the Nobel-prize winning poet was also calling on the Biblical sense of getting stoned: his haters tossing rocks at him. There’s also

SNOOP DOGG VIA WIKIMEDIA COMMONS (TOP), WEST MIDLANDS POLICE VIA WIKIMEDIA COMMONS (BOTTOM)

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Black Sabbath Sweet Leaf Marijuana and metal together symbolize a powEssential Lyric: “They’ll stone you erful rejection of societal and then say you are brave / They’ll norms and the original stone you when you are set down in Prince of Darkness and your grave” crew made that evident in this banger that always Peter Tosh seems to boost testosLegalize It terone and call for the volume to go up to 11.

Childish Gambino Redbone The multi-talented Donald Glover, producer of TV series Atlanta and musically known as Childish Gambino, has made it Essential Lyric: “Roll me up and clear that Black people smoke me when I die / And if anyone smoke weed to deal with don’t like it, just look ‘em in the eye” the trauma and PTSD of simply being Black and Manu Chao living in this country. He Essential Lyric: “You introduced me Clandestino also admits that cannato my mind / And left me wanting Singing in English, Span- bis helps him work. His you and your kind” ish, French, and Catalan, rap clicks all the boxes Manu Chao is housewhen it comes to scaring Sublime hold name in Europe your parents and pushes Smoke Two Joints and should be far better boundaries in exploiting This is a mandatory track It would be a crime to known here in the states. the ugliness of racism in on this mix. The Bush leave this anthem off this A proponent of global love this country. And, damn, Doctor was way ahead of playlist. Sublime, who and an unabashed canna- does this slow groove of his time both in seeing recently launched their bis advocate, he has been a song sound good when the spiritual and medicown cannabis brand, in semi-retirement for the you are in the mood. inal values of marijuana unapologetically loved the past decade but his music Essential Lyric: “If you need it, you better believe in something” and in calling for an end life of punk rockers and still makes you want to to the racist power syspartying. While that left get up and move. tem that made it illegal. lead singer Bradley Nowell Essential Lyric: “Mexicano, clandes- Kacey Musgraves tino / Marihuana, ilegal” Essential Lyric: “Doctors smoke it / Slow Burn tragically dead from an Nurses smoke it / Judges smoke it / overdose in 1996, the Country singer and Even lawyer, too” Rihanna songwriter Musgraves music that he left behind proved she’s not afraid continues to inspire a will- Same Ol’ Mistakes ingness to reject norms The pop sensation is to shock anyone when and seek individualism in front-and-center when she performed naked a world where it’s nearly it comes to her love of under a jacket on a recent impossible to escape con- cannabis—just scroll her episode of Saturday Night sumerism and sameness.

Instagram feed. And her Live. She has also been Essential Lyric: “’I work good and support of the plant goes forward about singing I work fine, / But first take care a long way in breakthe praises of cannabis of head’” ing stereotypes about to audiences that might weed. This is not stoner not be as open to it. Like Willie Nelson music—it’s get up, move most complex tunes, Roll Me Up and Smoke Me your booty, and feel good this song plays with the When I Die music. This cover of a sensual and destructive The frontman of the Tame Impala tune unites double entendres of a cannabis movement for hipsters and hip shakers. slow burn. decades, Willie actually Essential Lyric: “Not thinking in Essential Lyric: “I’m alright with a released this tune on April black and white / Thinking it’s worth slow burn / Takin’ my time, let the the fight” world turn” 20, 2012 (the year when biting criticism about the civil rights struggles of the day and the Vietnam War in this song.

Colorado became the first state to legalize recreational cannabis), to make his un-subtle point about where he stands. For extra emphasis, Snoop Dogg provides backup vocals.

LISTEN UP Be sure to check out an expanded version of this playlist on the Sensi Spotify channel.

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THE END

Green Goes Blue and Gold

California's MediThrive paints its walls the national colors of Ukraine to show support.

Dispensaries step up to support Ukrainians ravaged by war.

CALL TO ACTION If you want to help those affected by the war in Ukraine, you can support the businesses mentioned here and donate to World Kitchen (wck. org), Hope for Ukraine (hopeforukraine.net), and Sunflower of Peace (sunflowerofpeace.com).

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C O LO R A D O

Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine has displaced more than 6.5 million people and continues to devastate a nation determined to fight for its sovereignty. Ukrainians have fought bravely on the ground against a far superior force, but this modern war is also being waged across the globe on social media and in the power of a global economy uniting against it. The cannabis industry has even joined in the effort to bring aid to Ukrainians and protest the immorality of Putin’s war.

San Francisco-based dispensary MediThS P R I N G 2 02 2

irve (medithrive.com), which is owned by Ukrainian-Americans, painted its outside walls blue and gold (Ukraine’s national colors) and donated 100 percent sales on March 6 and 10 percent of sales thereafter for the week, to Sunflower of Peace, which is providing medical and humanitarian aid to the beleaguered nation. “I hope to do more as time goes on and be more hands on in the next effort,” says CEO Misha Breyburg.

“Anything and everything helps. This is a time in the world where a social post or a financial donation

is of the utmost importance. Every voice that speaks up with disgust about the war in Ukraine contributes to something bigger. It’s akin to that old idiom that a butterfly flapping its wings creates a tsunami.”

MediThrive is not alone in its efforts.

Homeland Growers Company (hvgcompany. com) normally donates 100 percent of its profits to aid veterans, but is dedicating that money to help Ukrainians through World Kitchen this month. California cannabis manufacturer Lime (limecannabis.co), with 30

percent of its workforce from countries affected by the war, donated a portion of its March sales to nonprofit Hope for Ukraine.

“In my 50 years, I’ve never seen people so ubiquitously on the same page as they are to help Ukrainians against the Russian invasion,” says Breyburg. “There are so many issues that divide us and, in the past 20 years, it feels as if we’ve been stuck in polarizing positions on those issues.

We’re on the same page with Ukraine, and I hope that’s an opportunity to build bridges.”

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