Hitchhiking to Aspen: a Medical Marijuana Encounter

Aspen, Colorado – I left my rental car with Jon and Janni so I ended up hitching to Aspen with just my carry-on bag, some bread, peanut butter, jelly, and a small plant/flower that was given to me in Denver for getting a cat out of a tree a few days ago at 11:00 at night.  It took 6 different vehicles and a wide variety of nice/crazy people to make it.  First off, thanks to all of you for your help.

6:30 AM: I woke up in Denver and Leif Haugen gave me a ride to Loveland.   In Loveland, I watched the first run of the Nor-Am Men’s Slalom.  Unfortunate, my Belgian friend, Bart Mollin, blew out of the first run.   However, that gave me a pleasantly, earlier than expected departure from Loveland.  Thanks Bart!

12:30 PM: Bart, his coach and I departed Loveland.  It was a pleasant drive as I don’t get to hang out with Bart very often. When they dropped me off at the roundabout at the middle Vail exit he said, “I feel really bad about leaving you right here.”  But for me it was the start of an entertaining journey.

1:05 PM: I tossed out my thumb and the first car a 2000 Chevy Caravan picked me up.  It was an older Austrian couple from Solden.  So we had a long discussion about American skiing, Solden, and the Riml family.  It was a great leg from there to Eagle.   As they dropped me off, I thanked them and the nice women said, “The truth is, the only reason I stopped was because I thought you were someone else.   Once you walked up to car and I realized I didn’t know you, I felt too bad to drive away so we gave you a lift.”   Either way, I was psyched to go some distance.

1:30 PM: I waited there for about 5 minutes in Eagle and a few dudes that just finished up work picked me up in a big pickup.  The first thing they did was offer me some snaps so I obliged.  It was a short trip from there to Jericho, which was sweet because they kept talking about smoking.

1:47  PM: I waited for around 7 minutes before an old 1984 Chevy Suburban came ripping around the corner and screeched to a halt.   The rig reeked of cigarettes as there was a thin film that covered everything.  However, it was a ride so I had no complaints.  This lady driving The Beast as she called it, was an energetic one.  I sat in the back seat because the front seat was filled with two things: a portable Bosch stereo that is commonly used at construction sites and what turned out to be a $60 pie she was delivering to a friend.   Around the first corner, she hit the breaks and the stereo slipped from the seat and slammed down onto the floor.  She immediately leaned across the massive front seat – full extended – trying to pick it up so we could listen to some more Rage Against the Machine.  She had one hand on the wheel swerving from lane to lane.  I jumped up to help extremely quickly as there was no seat belt to be found over the camouflage seat cover.  She looks back at me and says as she’s not looking at the road, “don’t worry, I have five kids I can drive distracted.”  During our 25 mile leg, the stereo dropped down three times.  And when we got close to Glenwood Canyon she turned around and asked me if I smoked.  I told her I get drug tested and she responded with, “That’s tough because you’ll be smelling it the rest of the way to Glenwood.”  During the drive through Glenwood Canyon, she repacked and smoked her apparatus three times  driving with one arm and sometimes just her knees.  For those of you that don’t know Glenwood Canyon, it’s not a place to drive distracted and her truck was so high that it could jump the guardrail down a hundred feet into the river bed.  I was pretty nervous for my life on a number of occasions.  She th0ughtfully explained, “don’t worry I have my card.”  Smoking marijuana in Colorado is completely legal as long as you have your medical marijuana card.  However, I don’t think they allow it while driving.

2:08 PM: I was a happy camper when I arrived in Glenwood Springs.  The driver of The Beast was a really nice lady, but I was happy to be back on foot.  I ended up walked thru Glenwood a little bit.  I think it was good for my back, but the damn thing is still sucking pretty hard.

2:35 PM: I was decompressing from my ride in The Beast and ready to put my thumb back to work. For ten minutes, no one picked me up.    During my ten minutes waiting for a ride, I learned it was time to completely changed my tactics.  I’d always go for a pleasant smile searching for eye contact to make it more personal, but that wasn’t working.  When I arrived in Glenwood Springs, I was in a great mood after successfully making it this far in pretty damn good time.  After ten minutes with my thumb out, I was no longer in a very good mood.  It wasn’t that I was bummed that none of the hundreds of cars that drove by me didn’t pick me up, it was because I could read the expressions of each driver as they drove by.  Driver after driver was thinking, “Really, you think I’d pick you up.”  “Hitchhikers are just as bad as beggers.”  “Get a job.”  “You’re destroying the fabric of American Society.” “You look like an ax murder – there is no way I’d ever pick you up.”  “Really. Really.  I’m soooo much better than you; I live in Aspen.”  “Get out of the way you parasite.”  So after seeing these thoughts in so many eyes.  I decided it was time to have a pleasant smile and just look out on the horizon so disgruntled drivers wouldn’t be in my head.

2:46 PM: Time to make a sign.  Luckily, I was right next to a hostel and some cardboard trash.

2:52 PM: I was back at it with my sign and a pleasant horizon smile.  Within a few minutes, I was back on the road and William told me it was sign that made him stop.

William is a CRMS (a private prep school in Carbondale) teacher and the most normal individual I found hitching. In Carbondale, I took a break at my cousin’s house that just got married over Thanksgiving.  They actually had a marriage ceremony in their living room between Thanksgiving dinner and desert.  They didn’t tell a single family member before hand.    Apparently, both mothers nearly fainted when the ordained minister and their friend said, “let’s come to the living room to witness the marriage of Molly and Ryan.   Congrats to Molly and Ryan!!!  I gave them my flower, plant as their impromptu wedding gift.  It was fun to chill with them for a couple hours and then a few friends picked me up for the final portion of my trip to ASPEN.

5:46 PM: Jason and Casey brought me the rest of the way to Assspen!

I made it!  w