I used to be a pothead. Before J. and I made the decision to conceive Bella, I smoked marijuana every single day, for over a year. After we’d made that decision, I quit, cold turkey. I let my system clear out for a few weeks and then we starting trying to have a baby. For years, I didn’t touch a stick, stem, leaf or seed of anything. But it damn sure wasn’t because it was wrong. I just wasn’t interested in doing it anymore.
I read a lot of mommy blogs, and I follow many mommies on Twitter. They are my community; I love them. I’ve come to find that really, the good ones? Are completely entertaining and relate-able and always give me something to think about or fawn over or smile because of. And it seems that right now, wine is all the rage.
“The kid is driving me insane with his tuba practicing! Ready for bed so I can break out the vino!”
“Baby’s finally down for the night. About time! I got a bottle of red waiting for me!”
“A glass of wine or two helps me sleep – better than any Ambien!”
“8pm!!! WINE TIME!!! Get your glasses out ladies! I’m sharing!”
“…and the day was so stressful that all I could think about during the parent teacher conference, as my son’s teacher raved about his excellent use of color in his rainbow drawings was the box of zinfandel in my fridge and how grand it would be when I could finally finish it off.”
Ok. That’s fine, right? Have your wine you gorgeous almost alcoholics – you deserve it. Parenting is a hard job.
But you know what really grinds my gears*? The fact that if I were to say something like:
“This day has been hell. The girls are in bed, and I’m heading outside to take a few hits off this blueberry kush that’s been begging me to light it up all day. Peace!”
These same perpetually bragging about being buzzed or tipsy or drunk women would turn their nose up, judge my parenting and wag their little fingers at the audacity I have to do that, let alone say it online.
BlogHer’s coming up. Let me ask you – how many of you have announced that you’ll be getting drunk as a skunk? And thinking I’m a total oddball for not partaking in the drinking? Mmhmm. Now, how many of you would think negatively of me if I said ‘don’t worry about me not being drunk – I’ll be high’? Mmmhmmm.
So, let me ask this question: what is the difference (besides the illogical and completely stupid illegality) between you drinking some fermented grapes and inhaling the fumes of a burning plant?
I’ll answer, it was rhetorical: there isn’t one. There is absolutely no difference. Not one. Not. One.
But, I have to say that the entire new culture of wine drinking moms annoys me. It’s like…a fad, you know? And it’s such crap. The whole 40’s housewife martinis and wine gag is just lame. A few years ago? There were no mommy blogs with titles that referred to drinking. Now, you’d be hard pressed to go through a blogroll and NOT find one. Because it’s…cool? I don’t fucking know, it’s something. There’s a reason why it seems every mom in the blogosphere drinks wine instead of beer, isn’t there? No one would call you a bad mom for saying you were having a corona, right? But yet, you rarely hear that. It’s always a glass of wine. I’m not the only one that picks up on the phoniness. I know it.
Now I realize that whole paragraph sounds pretty bitchy. I can’t help that. I’m not saying that if you are a blogger that happens to be known to be a drinker or anything that you’re a part of the fad or whatever – I’m just saying that there is one. And if you’re not a part of it, I’m sure you’ve noticed it, probably a lot more so than I do, since it rings the similarity bell, yes?
Where’d this whole blog post come from? Well, it came from a tweet I saw a few months ago (I’m slow, shush!) from someone blasting some woman she knew or didn’t know or whatever for smoking pot and basically called her mothering into question because of that ‘filthy habit’. This same woman tweeted pretty frequently about her fondness for red wine.
The hypocrisy, it boils my blood. The fact that one is so widely accepted and the other so widely rejected bothers me. And the fact that 1/2 of the issue it’s all just a guise, an effort to be ‘in’ is troublesome.
I’m not doing my best to get my point across right now, and I’m covering two different points that should be in two entirely different posts, probably, so I’ll just sum it up with this: I were to name my blog Beer Pong Champ Mommy or Marijuana Matriarch, I’d have fire and brimstone raining down upon me. Because that wouldn’t be very motherly. Or classy. Or…appropriate.
That’d be too much, too honest, too real, too not smoke and mirrors.
It’s all about perception.
And that’s just another way of saying it’s all about bullshitting.
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Listening to: James Morrison – Call The Police
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I simply refuse to discuss things of an illegal nature and/or my involvement in said things in forums such as this one.
I’m on enough lists already.
But… yeah… hypocrisy run amok. Amok, amok, amok.
I have been trying really hard to break myself of the habit of referring to the need to de-stress or relax as the need to “have a drink” lately, basically because I mentioned it in passing at a wedding and realized I was seated at the AA table.
Oops.
Sadly, I think the drinking statement has become synonymous with an expression of stress, which is really, really fucked up and unhealthy from whichever way you look at it. It would be much healthier to say “damn, after the day I’ve had I need a massage, or an orgasm!”
And yes, like you, legality is the only issue I have with reasonable pot use. (I say reasonable here because wake and bakers are as bad as alcoholics imo.)
A-fucking-men Maria. It’s really annoying to me that those things are somehow not at all considered equal. I see what you mean about the wine/booze thing being part of this whole ‘bad mom’ fad. I just don’t get it. I dunno, maybe it’s just because I don’t TRY to be someone else when I write, I’m just… me.
If either option would help me actually sleep, I’d be willing to give them a shot. When I do get wine (very rarely. The bottle I bought recently was the first in almost two years), I get such a cheap bottle that I think I’m actually just enjoying a glass of pricy fruit juice after the kids are in bed. I’m quite hardcore!
Weird. Literally today i was kind of wishing I liked wine more, because I was beginning to feel left out of some kind of party I was unaware was even going on.
You’re right, there is absolutely no difference between pot smoking and drinking wine. In fact, I could handle a few hits way better than a couple glasses of wine. Usually after one glass of wine I’m off to bed with a headache.
Dude, when I say, “I’m enjoying a lovely moscato with my dessert” what I mean is “I’m toking on this excellent KUSH, y’all.”
Hey. I’m not going to judge anyone. Americans are way too uptight about that shit. You heard that from ME. An educator. A top educator in a school where part of my job is to punish kids who have been smoking cigarettes OR weed (because honestly? I have SERIOUSLY said this to my students: Can you get through the day without that? Jesus!)
Also, I’m a recent convert to wine. Got lots of wine distributor friends (who are like Bebe’s Kids once you meet them) and a part of what I’m decided to do after getting divorced is DOING stuff. Wine tastings were a part of that. So I’ll keep tweeting about that and you smoke your buddha and we’ll call it even.
Because it IS.
I’d only bat an eye if the mom smoking out was breastfeeding. Cause it seems like there’s not enough research on that. Otherwise who the fuck cares, seriously.
I don’t drink beer, I never have. I think it tastes ABSOLUTELY vile. I’ve been drinking wine and tequila since college and still do. The wine thing does strike me as kind of faddish but I’m a snotbag about it. I like good wines, and wine drinking as sort of a hobby.
But the drinking while parenting thing doesn’t really bother me at all. I’m glad it’s OKAY to say that someone is gonna have a Bud Light or a glass of wine or whatever. I grew up with young parents who had beers in their hands every single night. I dunno.
If we’re being honest, I am sometimes a little naive-ly shocked by the amount of pill-popping conversation that floats about. Prescription drugs make me nervous.
Pot does not make me nervous. (I don’t smoke cause it makes me sick as a dog. Which sucks. I hope I don’t ever need it medicinally.)
I swear I love you more and more each blog! Lol- My fellow stuck-up-well-off-suburban PTA moms would be appalled to know that I hit the spliff and the bottle on MY TIME! I have straight “A” honor roll kids excelling on the swim team and gymnastics. I wish someone would call me out on my parenting. BTW ever watched Weeds? What a great show! Most folks need to self-evaluate before they point out the flaws in others which is the plight of this country. But I digress. Thanks for sharing your point of view on things. As always …You rock!
You make an excellent point. In my past I have seen more people totally hosed on alcohol than they ever would have been on pot (that reference prolly says more about my age.) Stoned is stoned, no matter what your ‘drug.’ The hypocrisy is annoying.
I do have a glass or two of wine some evenings at home, but if I’m out, it’s beer. I don’t like being drunk, avoid it, because I don’t like the feeling of being out of control.
As long as you are a good mother, I don’t see anything wrong with either option! But hypocrites are what 90% of the blog world is all about :(
Awesome post. Best one I’ve read all day.
Those who can’t do, teach.
Wait, that made no sense…maybe it was the beer.
You KNOW I agree with you – totally.
(I like wine and weed – but I am such an old loser that I rarely partake in anything, unless it’s a party. :)
I’ll take a joint over wine any(every)day. These winos should get off their high horses and smoke a little of the peace pipe. We all have some sort of vice and just because some prefer weed over vino doesn’t make them bad although it would be a better argument if they legalized it. ;) Smoke ‘em if you got ‘em.
Classism abounds online, and wine somehow codes as a “classy” substance. Even if it comes from a box, right? But certainly not if you are packing your substance in a Roor–you are right–that would flip some tweets.
It’s just not a huge deal up here. I only do it when I’m staying somewhere safe and my kids are not around. So every few months or so. Having said that, I live here and have a border to cross to get to BlogHer, so I won’t be bringing any. Given the choice, I will do that before any sort of drinking, and now I’m only tolerant of beer anyway. Wine & hard liquor give me insta-headache – it’s like having my hangover while I’m still drinking and it’s no fun!
I’m not a big drinker, only drink occasionally, and even then, not much. I have never been a pot smoker.
There is a difference, and it’s not just a legal one: the use of marijuana, like many other drugs, is much more damaging to the nervous system than alcohol, when both are consumer recreationally. If you monitor the brainwaves and activity of someone smopking pot and someone sipping wine, they won’t look the same -long-term use of cannabis can actually create damage even when done recreationally, while alcohol mainly threatens the liver, which regenerates every 3 weeks.
Still, I understand the annoyance at the whole “drinking is cool” thing that seems to be going on these days. I never weighted in because, really, to each his own. And I have times when I feel like a glass of wine might help me unwind. But I purposely avoid even getting into that, and choose a good book and a cup of tea as my “unwinding” ritual.
To each his own. I don’t think drugs are cool, no matter whether they are legal or not.
@iammommymae gonna break out the manischewitz! woot!
@iammommymae puff, puff, pass
seriously, though, i like a toke, when not nursing & i’m still doing that, so…can’t yet. BUT i can enjoy a beer or 2. don’t like wine much except for previously mentioned shabbat wine that we always have on hand, but only ever really drink on shabbat & passover. i think the thing that drives me craziest about the illegality argument is that drunk driving is totally illegal, but drinkers don’t seem to be able to control that shit & it isn’t poo-pooed as much as pulling a bong hit. put some of that drug war money into getting drunks off the road.
I’m too drunk to respond right now…….catch ya later ;)
I blame Twitter for my margarita addiction.
But then again it is only once a month or so.
AND I did promise the kids I would give up smoking ;)
I’ve never smoked before, just because it’s not my thing, smoking period. But I’ve been around many people who smoked. And let me tell you, I know a lot of people who could USE a good joint. They need to CHILL and I honestly think that would be the best thing for them! If I could get it in a form that I didn’t have to smoke, I’d be all over it. I totally support the legalization of it as well.
Oh and Marijuanna Matriarch?! LMAO!
Just because its legal doesn’t make it good for you. Cigarettes and alcohol are completely legal yet do an enormous amount of damage physically and emotionally. Every time I read a post that promotes or normalises drinking (to relax, to have fun etc) I cringe. I hope these mommy’s are making it up, that they don’t really crack open the cask at a moments notice. So I completely agree with you with the hypocrisy of approving of one mind altering drug while denying the other (legalities aside). When their children come home drunk, or don’t come home at all perhaps they won’t think its so funny after all.
If I drank copious amounts of wine before being a Mommy does that make me part of the “fad”.
Could be that women as a whole tend to like the taste of wine better than beer. But anyway.
For me, I guess that I would question the ability to parent while high totally based upon my own experiences. Being high (back in the day) had me feeling FAR FAR less in control than being drunk. I would not have been able to function in a proper capacity should an emergency arise.
But anyway. After all is said and done. I do see your point about smoking a joint being no worse in many ways than having drinks. But I’m not in total agreement with drinking as a mommy fad.
I don’t think that I have told you this lately….
I fucking love you!
Oh – and Bud Light Lime, Miller Light, Yeungling or St. Pauli Girl Dark. Wine gives me a hangover and costs more!
I totally agree with you. I was going to spout about how very much I agree but that first comment about the scary possibility of arrest and what that could do to a family gives me pause. I think it is just ridiculous that it is illegal and alcohol is legal. Totally stupid.
I drink beer. And proclaim so freely. Wine makes me weepy.
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