I am writing this on a Sunday in April, day five of this weather. It is supposed to freeze overnight, with possible snow, and then, by Tuesday, be sunny and 70 again.
I’ m about to turn 70, and I’ m in the yard of people I have met along the way, but who really don’ t know me. Before the pandemic, back when we were having conferences and shows, and Karin Spinks was working her magic at events like“ The Blaze,” I became friends with the Blue Key family. I admire their grit as one of the few surviving CBD companies in the state. I came to Jim’ s birthday camp-out last summer and fell in love with the land and the people. But this was a big ask, and I am humbled and grateful beyond words for the way they have taken me in as one of their own.
six-year-old child sitting on a concrete cinder block, surrounded by his burned-out neighborhood. I don’ t remember which fire, Mau or Palisades.
A reporter stopped to talk to the child. The boy looked out over the burned ruins and said,“ I can’ t make this about me. This is about all of us.”
I don’ t know who that young kid was, but I know his words inspired me, and they will stay with me as long as I live. This isn’ t about me. This is about all of us and what it will take for us all to survive whatever is ahead. We are now dependent on each other and the community, and this is where our focus needs to stay. This is about all of us, and survival will require all the grit we have within.
Thank you sincerely from the bottom of my heart to everyone who had a hand in getting me here, to our entire cannabis community. Thank you for the $ 5 donations to my GoFundMe from people who needed that $ 5 for gas or groceries. Thank you all.
And especially, thank you to this family— Jim, Katie, and their four children, Jack, Jaydon, Jet, and Cora— for sharing their space, food, and time with this crazy old lady who suddenly appeared in their yard and welcomed me as family.
Katie and Jim Thomas were kind enough to allow me to park my“ Duck” in their yard— temporarily.
It has been a battle between grief and loss and gratitude from day one. But I have had to put on my granny panties, suck it up, and realize how much more I got down here than what so many Americans were left with this past year. I trust when the dust settles, my kitties will come home.
Until the sun shines again, we just all have to hang in there!
Or, at least until the cats come home.
Fire leaves nothing. Floods leave some stuff, but it’ s ruined. Then, there’ s North Carolina, which got hit by Hurricane Helene and floods and is now burning with wildfires. I know I’ m so much more fortunate than so many left with nothing.
I think this will continue to be the norm going forward as we hunker down for what Mother Nature, politics, and climate change have in store for us. We are all going to have to find our grit while getting as much cannabis in the ground as humanly possible to remediate the damage we have done to the earth.
By realizing what I am going through is shared by an astounding number of Americans right now, I fall back on the wisdom of a
Dolores Montgomery Halbin, RN, BSN, and Ordained Nurse Minister, resides in SW Missouri. After her husband passed in 2015, she retired from nursing. She worked with the 2014- 2018 Missouri campaigns for legalized medical marijuana. She continues as a cannabis reform activist volunteering with Canna Convict Project and working toward Federal decriminalization through educational speaking and freelance journalism. Dolores Halbin, doloreshalbin @ gmail. com.
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