In Praise of the Cannabis Cafe:

When in Amsterdam . . .

“A man walks into a bar. . .”

Stop. Already there’s a disconnect for me, and it’s all the more acute because I know that for most people, a bar signals relaxation, camaraderie and fun. What a great idea, going into a place where everyone around you has decided to unwind--and where you may even know some of the customers! Cheers!

It’s a wonderful concept, but it just doesn’t work for me. Even ignoring the damage heavy consumption does to drinkers and their families, I simply don’t relate to drinking.

It’s partly because my body doesn’t tolerate it well. I get sick before I get high. There seems to be a gate in my throat that locks before I’ve finished a second drink, and after that, I simply cannot imbibe any more. I’ve had a hangover exactly once in my long life, and I’ve gotten sick from drinking only a couple of times. I do like the initial effects of alcohol inebriation: I feel carefree and flirtatious—but only for fifteen minutes. After that, I just feel tired. Or I vomit. Apparently, alcohol doesn’t work for this particular body.

In addition, I just don’t like the taste. For decades, I’d been panicked by the question, “What are you drinking?” because to me most drinks tasted terrible. At about forty, I finally realized that sweet drinks mostly masked the astringent taste of alcohol, so I would say, “Margarita,” or “Daiquiri.” Tequila and rum taste less bad to me than does other hard liquor. In the past few years, when I feel obligated to drink, I’ve been having the sweet elderberry liqueur, Saint-Germain--which now tickles me because for the last two months, we’ve been living on the Boulevard Saint-Germain in Paris. . . but I digress.

What about wine? Especially during these Paris months? Alas—I don’t even like wine! And here I feel somewhat ashamed, because, apparently, I don’t have a faculty other people blithely possess. How can they pay hundreds of dollars for a bottle of wine because it will “taste better”? To me, it will never taste good! How can they devote time and money to wine tastings or to becoming oenophiles? Surely no wine is as delicious as a glass of freshly-squeezed orange juice (also a staple in Paris).

So not liking wine, when others mysteriously do, sets me apart from most of the people I know. It also mandates social dishonesty. “Oh, good, you’ve brought wine! How lovely!”

In addition, I don’t like how alcohol affects many people in a bar. After the initial joviality comes a certain coarseness. Their smiles are broader, their laughs are louder, and they also become more aggressive. Flirtation yields to crude assessments and rude invitations. If you’re not into the bar culture, a drinking establishment can feel like a scary place. After all, the barroom fight is a cinematic staple.

So, no, I almost never walk into a bar

Like other cannabistas, however, I have long fantasized about smoking weed in a bar-like environment, where you’d get the camaraderie without the drunkenness. How wonderful it would be to do this long-forbidden thing openly, at an indoor table, and in public.

Hello, Amsterdam! As a dedicated, almost professional pot-smoker and advocate,

I wanted to visit one of the city’s famous cannabis cafes to feel the bar-vibe without the bar-violence. (Note to self: Ask accountant: write off Amsterdam trip as a business expense?) There are over 150 so called “coffeeshops” in Amsterdam where you can buy marijuana and hash before choosing your table, ordering coffee, and sampling your new purchases.

“Do you have any pre-rolls?” I asked at the counter.

“Of course.” Many pre-rolls were available; I chose the most potent, because after 60-odd years of smoking cannabis, I have a very, um, high tolerance. I do not smoke for taste or terpenes: I smoke to get high. I also bought a lighter. I brought my goodies to our table, and soon the waitress came by to take our cappuccino orders.

And then . . . I lit up!

Those three little words hardly convey the exaltation I felt as the Bic fueled the tip of my large, potent joint! This was the café experience I’d been denied my whole life. This was it!

I glanced about. I saw two elegant young women make purchases at the counter without sitting down to sample their wares. I saw an old woman in a wheelchair smoking at the next table. I saw another tourist couple at a table, smoking with their cups of coffee--smoking weed with their cups of coffee! What a wonderful sight to behold!

In my lifetime, cannabis has come a long way in the USA, from being an illegal drug (and a pretext for jailing Black activists and hippies) to being a billion-dollar industry with celebrity brands. Today, there are more daily weed smokers than daily drinkers.

Yet while in New York state I can walk into a dispensary and buy a wide variety of cannabis products, there is no place I can consume them in the company of strangers who also like smoking weed—that is, my peeps! I’ve heard about consumption lounges attached to American dispensaries, but I’ve never seen one.

But a weed café, where coffee and cannabis, my favorite drugs, are openly sold and consumed, I’ve yet to find in any place but Amsterdam. And so, although the city’s canals and museums beckoned, I lingered in the coffeeshop. It felt like the home I had always imagined.

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Initial photograph of author with giant joint pillow by Mark Thompson