Here I am about to write an entry about how we need to return to a simpler, less fast food, slower pace, for the sake of the planet, and our sanity, and our civilization, and I’m sitting in a Starbucks, typing on a Mac, with an iPhone in my pocket…I am such a tool bag. I might as well cap it off by throwing my trash on the sidewalk while complaining about stepping in dog poop.

This past weekend I went back home to my parent’s house in New Hampshire. The weather cooperated and Monday morning I went for a motorcycle ride to the beach. (Boy the irony of this entry is completely staggering…) On my way to the coast, I took a rural country road, complete with a tractor vendor, silos, and produce stands, along its twisting, winding path to the sea. It really was quite idyllic, the juxtaposition of the countryside often imagined further inland, on the same road that essentially tapers off into marshland and ends at a T-junction at the sea, was most enjoyable.

I felt quite peaceful, an emotion often associated with people who ride motorcycles, having the day to myself and an open schedule. I took my time riding to the beach with no real destination aside from a bookstore, and not much else. I had the loose idea that I wanted to see the ocean and other than that, I was okay with whatever else happened. Living in Boston, despite it being a coastal city, does not share that: “city by the sea” mentality, as the harbor is clogged with industry, and hotels. The last time I tried to stay in Boston and go to the water, I sat on a park bench watching an MBTA water taxi tie up to the dock, load passengers, and depart back around a warehouse on a pier.

I travelled through Hampton, NH, Salisbury Beach, MA and became progressively bummed out at the shadow of what must have once been a bucolic seaside village. Now it was a depressed, almost abandoned beach town, full of people who looked as worn down as the boarded up shops along the road. The amount of fireworks, beer, and dingy tattoo shops was alarming, as it seemed the town was struggling, relying solely on out of state visitors stocking up on vice before heading back home. I stopped for a few moments on the beach, where I immediately found lots of plastic trash buried a few inches beneath the sand dunes, and an acute smell of sulfur, like sun-roasted garbage at low tide. I promptly got back on the “hog” and left to try to find a road less travelled, or at least where I wouldn’t get stuck in traffic.

Down the road a piece from places worn out, lays Newburyport, Mass. A place that has either escaped the clutches of time, or more likely, has constantly striven to avoid it, by keeping things looking like a seaside New England town. Very clean, quiet, and thoroughly whitewashed, Newburyport had green space, brick buildings, and even an artesian food and wine shop, across the street from an iconic white-steepeled, wooden church.

I thought: “Wow this seems much more relaxed and set apart from where I was an hour ago.” I felt a connection with the Main St. mentality of the one off shops and restaurants, where the idea of a genuine experience seems to prevail over cookie-cutter commercialism. I felt like that was the way things should be, slower. There’s plenty of places in the country where this sort of behavior exists. People weren’t honking their horns, yelling at their kids, and even the police seem to be pretty mellow. What happened along the way? When and why did things take a turn for the more insane and hectic, and how did we allow this to happen? Even the Dalai Lama’s Paradox of our Age suggests:

The Paradox of Our Age

We have bigger houses but smaller families;

more conveniences, but less time;

We have more degrees, but less sense;

more knowledge, but less judgement;

more experts, but more problems;

more medicines, but less healthiness;

…

How did the process of growing our own food, working with people towards something positive, or even just being polite and courteous, turn into honking the car horn in line at the drive through at McDonalds and complaining about the price of a fast food lobster roll? Or better yet, how did I end up sitting in a Starbucks lamenting about the loss of simpler times, while drinking coffee from a 3^rd world country, on my computer with minerals components possibly harvested from the same country. Do I at least get extra points for my egregious behavior being consistent?

-Jameson Viens is an aspiring writer and apparently an entitled, experienced hypocritical blowhard.

Lessons Learned – Jameson Vienes

Whether you like it or not, you have undoubtedly heard about the run ins Lindsay Lohan, one of Hollywood’s favorite bad girls has had with the law. Whether its stealing, probation violation, or failed drug tests, whenever it hits the fan for the actress, the news media ghouls are all over it.  Recently Lohan has been released from house arrest and is continuing to chip away at the growing pile of community service.

This isn’t a plea to “LEAVE BRITTNEY ALONE” as it were, or some TMZ/Perez Hilton gossip garbage, but more of a reflection on how our culture views stardom and substance abuse.  It seems that when the news gets too bad, about one of our several wars going off the rails, the economy in the toilet, or American extremists screaming about the rights of gays, that a fluff piece slides between the cracks and lands on the evening news, or one of the 24/7 newscapade channels.

We’ve heard it so many times before, the rise to stardom; the struggles with substance abuse, and the inevitable downfall of idols that we love to hate and yet can’t help to love. Robert Downey Jr. Charlie Sheen, Eminem, Amy Winehouse (who recently cancelled a string of tours due to her struggling addiction), the list goes on and on. Only afterwards, post-recovery or after someone has died do people get to see the inward corruption of substance abuse and the toll it causes.

After a litany of violations, arrests, and sentences, Lohan is once again in the center of a media whirlwind, for her struggles with substance abuse and issues with shoplifting. If anyone in the news lately seems to be crying out for help, consciously or not, Lohan is one of them.

We as a culture need to discontinue the idea that people who use drugs are criminals, and people who do not use them in moderation need to be locked up and punished. Of course certain situations require certain finesse and not every infraction should be overlooked/forgiven, (ie: drug trafficking, drug-related violence) but its pretty clear that some people are in dire need of help, for the benefit of moving us forward as a people.

In a defiant move, Portugal has decriminalized a laundry list of formerly hard street drugs in attempts to focus on: “treatment and prevention instead of jailing users would decrease the number of deaths and infections.”  -  Scientific American

“The political consensus in favor of decriminalization is unsurprising in light of the relevant empirical data. Those data indicate that decriminalization has had no adverse effect on drug usage rates in Portugal, which, in numerous categories, are now among the lowest in the EU, particularly when compared with states with stringent criminalization regimes. Although post decriminalization usage rates have remained roughly the same or even decreased slightly when compared with other EU states, drug-related pathologies — such as sexually transmitted diseases and deaths due to drug usage — have decreased dramatically. Drug policy experts attribute those positive trends to the enhanced ability of the Portuguese government to offer treatment programs to its citizens — enhancements made possible, for numerous reasons, by decriminalization.” – CATO Institute

We may not yet be able to experience softened drug policy in this country, like Portugal or Amsterdam, a city that is experiencing a hardening of their drug policy, banning tourists from visiting their famous coffee shops, and has already banned the use of psychedelic mushrooms.

A recent report from the Global Commission on Drug Policy notes the international crackdown on the drug trade has had “devastating consequences for individuals and societies around the world.” The commission includes former presidents of South America, Prime Ministers, and members of the United Nations.

The evidence is pretty clear; places like Portugal and Amsterdam have lenient drug policies and treat substance abuse how it should be treated, with compassion, respect, and patience. Even certain cities in the United States, are a hairs breadth away from legalizing marijuana outright and there isn’t rampant drug chaos in the streets of California, Colorado, Rhode Island.

If we want to get anywhere we can’t get off on the wrong foot, banning more substances and punishing bad behavior with prison sentences and negative reinforcement.