Trees, I had an amazing experience this weekend I have to share. Hopefully it'll lift some spirits.

So I've been living abroad in Mexico for a couple months, and have been dry the whole time. I decided it was smart to take a break because I wasn't sure of the quality/safety of stuff here and I didn't want to contribute to the drug cartels. However, I'm from CA and with all the Prop 19 stuff happening this past weekend, I felt like there was something bigger then me happening, and wanted to be a part of it. So I cast my vote by mail and thought that was it.

But, this past week I went on a spontaneous road trip to celebrate Dia de los Muertos with some new friends from couchsurfing (if you don't know what that is, look it up). We immediately hit it off; they were an amazing group. When we got to the village, it was packed, and were lucky enough to find a single room on the top floor of a cheap motel.

We are kicking back with some beers after our 7 hour drive, and I'm thinking, "Great, beer again when I would so much rather be smoking", when I smell it. Like an old familiar friend the sweet sweet smell of Mary Jane comes wafting through the window. "I smell weed!" I said, a stupid grin on my face. One of my new friends bolts outside the room to investigate, and sees a group sitting on the roof of the motel. So we grabbed the rest of our beers and went to make some new friends.

It turns out they were a travelling band here to play for the festivities, and they brought a guitar up on the roof with them. Long story short, 10 minutes later, I'm sitting on a roof with 6 Mexicans, another American, and a guy from Denmark passing a joint and singing Have You Ever Seen the Rain at the top of my lungs. Not everyone was smoking, but there was no judgement, only an atmosphere of acceptance and unrestrained joy. When the guitarist (who was nothing short of amazing) started playing the theme music from the original Mario, I knew life couldn't get any better then this.

That's when I realized, even though I couldn't be in CA to support Prop 19, it didn't matter, because this whole thing is so much bigger then that. Friends, our community goes beyond borders, it goes beyond backwards laws, and it goes beyond hatred and ignorance. No amount of votes cast against us can ever keep us down because what we do is a thing of love, acceptance, and peace that is more eternal then the governments that have been put in place. So light up and relax, my fellow ents, because everything is gonna be alright. I love you all.

Edit: RustyJ mentioned starting a "treesurf" subreddit, where you could host/crash with fellow ents around the globe while travelling. Thoughts? Link here for discussion.