Nature

In the beginning of chapter thirteen, Mark is at the lake with Scott and they are smoking pot. In Mark’s head he goes through a series of thought, or ideas about how pot can get him in trouble and possibly lead him into using hard drugs. He thinks that once you start using it, you will end up selling drugs and end up in jail. Scott explains that when he smokes nature become his teacher. He learns things when he is “stoned”. When Mark starts to smoke all of his worries and thoughts fade away and he loses his sense of time. He instantly becomes full of joy and starts to laugh about everything. He has an epiphany of how all of his abstract ideas and thoughts become concrete and relative. They become connected to one another and everything makes sense. Scott explained it as being a points within a circle that all lead back to the same point. Mark is ecstatic and he doesn’t stop being amazed by that idea. I personally think that when you smoke for your first time a lot of things change. Your thoughts about your surrounding become more abstract, and you begin think about the world in a different way. For me, the first time I tried smoking was with my brother. He had been smoking for a long time and always wanted me to do it. After a few years of him hassling me about it, I gave in. At first I thought it was a great idea, but then it started to become a habit. I would always want to smoke and I felt like I had the same thoughts and ideas that Mark had.

Nature became something completely different for me and I was learning from it just how Scott explained it. There were times when I thought that I knew everything there was to know and I could instantly come up with a theory or hypothesis about anything. This mindset led me to become distracted with my school work and I had troubles focusing on what I should have been doing. After a year of smoking I felt like I had experienced enough and that it was an appropriate time to stop. I didn’t have the urge anymore to smoke and get high. I began to focus on my schoolwork and my grades were improving. I had felt that because I smoked, I instantly knew everything and I didn’t need to learn from anyone except nature. I had similar ideas and conclusion that Mark had, but it made me realize that I didn’t really need to smoke to learn from nature. When I stopped smoking I still had similar thoughts just like when I was high, but I didn’t need pot to have them. Stopping for me was a good idea because I was able to improve my grades and focus on tasks that I usually couldn’t when I smoked. Nature still teaches me things and I learn a lot from it. I think that I will continue learning things from it; I just don’t need to smoke to feel good or happy anymore.