I’ve been cleaning out my phone, prepping for a switch to a new model. Moving images, contacts, and all that stuff should be easy, but over the years I also created over 250 text memos, some fanciful (see the previous post) and some more sober. This particular snippet captures my impressions of the celebration of 4-20 in Chicago this year.

A crowd of more than a hundred people. Ages, gender, apparent socio-economic status, all diverse. Maybe the most diverse event I’ve ever attended in Chicago.

Let us give thanks the day is warm.

Activists are active. A man has stood rock still beside a concrete flower bed for half an hour. His shoes are nice. Now he tilts his head forward. Now back. Now, he puts his hands in the planter. He could have my chair, but he doesn’t want a chair. He wants to hunch over the planter, fingers in the dirt, repotting himself on 4-20.

Based on the rate of customers processed during my wait so far, I’m guessing that inside customers are treated to a slide show and oral history of weed throughout the ages before being allowed to purchase product.

Smoking weed is strictly forbidden at the street festival. A wasted man sits opposite me, basking in the sun and warmth of the edibles consumed (he whispers to those of us in the vicinity) an hour ago.

What a strange new holiday this is.