The herb gets an upgrade?

I recently attended an art installation at a gallery. An art installation is a display of a three-dimensional piece of art that is often site-specific and designed to transform the perception of space… Oh goodness. How about we just call it an art exhibition? My job sometimes dictates that I visit such places. They are usually great places to hobnob, make contacts and realise just how little you know about art.

How it happens is that you walk in, grab a glass of wine and walk around looking at paintings or sculptures, pretending you get it. There is nothing wrong with pretension in art because it’s about perception. No answer is wrong. But art can be complicated, especially abstract art, and part of enjoying art is allowing it to make you curious, to confuse you and inspire you.

You prod it and you question it and when you are done you realise you understand it even less than you did before.

POSH NGO GIRL

At some point in the evening I notice this girl wearing this lovely kente and – bolstered by two glasses of red wine – I shuffle over to her to pay her compliments and make banter about African fashion, which I know squat about. She works as programmes something-something for an NGO. Loves art. And music. You know the type. We get chatting. Quite an engaging girl, she turns out to be. The type who puts commas in conversations with a nod.

At some point she says, “Look, I need to take a ciggie-break [posh NGO types speak like that], wanna join me?” I don’t smoke but I could use some fresh air. So we step out and she puts a stick between her lips and lights up. When she exhales a stream of smoke, I’m shocked that it isn’t cigarette’s she is smoking but weed! Cannabis sativa for crying out loud! Right there in the open!

What if the cops show up? I wondered to myself. But I play it like Don Draper and stay cool. I pretend like standing outside in public places next to a woman wearing kente and smoking weed is something I do all the damn time.

You should have seen her, all so nonchalant. Like she had the law in her back pocket. She chatted away, totally ignoring the weed until I started suspecting that perhaps my sense of smell might be wrong and that indeed it was a cigarette. I couldn’t focus on the conversation to be honest, I was too shifty.

UNEXPECTED OFFER

You won’t believe what happened next; she hands me the stick, casually, like you would hand someone a saltshaker. And right that moment I had a decision to make: be the principled guy, who stands for something and say no. Or succumb to peer pressure and try to be the person she thinks I am. I did what you would have done: I took the weed. I took a puff and tried not to cough. And failed.

That thing went to my head quickly. She prattled on, talking about something to do with literary inefficiency... or was it medical deficiency? I couldn’t focus on the conversation, I was feeling slightly disoriented. But I remember asking her how often she smokes weed and her saying, “Well, every other day.” Unbelievable.

What’s fascinating was that she wasn’t someone you would expect to be doing weed. The stereotype you might be accustomed to, of fist-bumping, red-eyed, reggae-chanting, Sahara-wearing, torn-jeans rocking girls with dreadlocks is out the narrow window. Now they are professional ladies in middle management who wear heels and can tell the difference between pinot noir and sauvignon blanc. Ladies who smoke weed as casually as they apply lip gloss.

Then I wondered who dates a girl like that. Just how liberal is this guy? How open-minded do you have to be? Does he also smoke? Is he her supply, perhaps? I wondered how you would handle a woman like this when she is all zonked out? Do you stay sober or do you also light up? When she gets high, what does that do to her as a woman? What about as a lover? Where would that relationship lead? To the altar?

Maybe she doesn’t even want to get married, a girl like that. Or even want children. Maybe she is happy with her weed and her fancy kente. Maybe she looks at us who don’t smoke weed, and feels sorry for us.