How many registered cannabis patients do you think live in Colorado? How many refugees have given up their former lives to pack up and move here for access to medical cannabis? How many people in general utilize cannabis in some form or another in our state? There are approximately 108,000 registered cannabis patients and out of that many, how many of you have a clue as to what is happening in some city’s across Colorado regarding your rights as a cannabis patient? Very few.
Back in 2012 when the Amendment 64 campaign was rearing its ugly head, I was against it for several reasons. Not because I’m a selfish bitch that didn’t think everyone deserves access to cannabis, it was because, it was and is, a garbage piece of legislative prohibition, designed to benefit our government in the form of higher tax dollars, in disguise as “legalization.” We were all assured by 64 supporters that “medical would not be affected.” A64 was nothing but “legal lies” and too many people lapped it up as “progression” and “baby steps” towards “legalization.” “Regulation works,” “Regulate like alcohol.” Bullshit, all of it, as predicted!
Let’s forget about Amendment 64 for a minute and before you chastise me for using the term “medical cannabis,” there is a difference. That difference is, Amendment 20 and those of us that rely on cannabis as our medicine. For us, it’s not about just “getting high.” And no, I don’t have anything against anyone that does. Cannabis should be available to us all, but not this way. Not thru Amendment 64.
Right now, right under your noses we are slowly being made criminals once again. The MED is “recommending” to all jurisdictions to limit plant counts. One by one, city by city, slowly, Amendment 20 is being blown off by Colorado government officials, in part because of the fact that we have rec and rec generates more tax funds. You might think that it doesn’t matter because we “have A64”. But it does.
In a recent article in local paper the “Gazette Telegraph,” Colorado Springs City Council proposed ordinance 16-52, on May 10, that was signed by Mayor John Suthers, just a few days after on May 13.
In a nut shell, this ordinance (above,) is making it criminal to grow more than 12 plants per household without regard to the fact of ones plant count recommendation (Read above links). Yes, you heard it, it will be CRIMINAL! You will be a CRIMINAL, for exercising your rights under Amendment 20. Pay attention to what this will mean for patients here and eventually in the entire state.
Colorado Springs is a home rule municipality and basically what that means, is they can make their own rules. HOWEVER, when it comes to this situation they can not decide how many plants a patient is allowed to have! What the fuck? Why is this happening? Amendment 64. Why isn’t it being stopped? Greed and ignorance.
All patients with higher plant counts will be affected, however, the patients that will be hurt the most are some of the many children whose parents moved here to treat their childrens rare illnesses with cannabis. Two of the families that will be affected and turned into criminals if arrested, will be Moms, Rebecca Lockwood and Marisa Kiser. Because of their childrens high plant counts and the negative impact it would have on their childrens health, Rebecca and Marisa, sprung into action. They decided to set up a meeting with City Council to get some answers and find compassion for all patients and spear headed an email campaign to Springs City Council.
Rebecca fears for the health and well-being of her child Calvin, as he has a plant count of 73 to treat his femoral retroversion, a debilitating abnormality, affecting the lower extremities.
http://www.aafp.org/afp/2003/0801/p461.htmlhttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T8OYxQq7mIEMarisa Kisers son Ezra, just turned 4 and went in hospice when he was just 3. He suffers from violent seizures and at one time, had an unexplained onset of dystonia so severe that he broke 8 bones in one year. He has a 72 plant count. These are just 2 of the families that will be affected by this bullshit.
It was in a May 31 meeting that the Moms were told by the council members in attendance that, “The limited plants counts are just the beginning, a ban will be placed on all home grows, not just here, but thru out the state.” This very phrase was confirmed the beginning of June from council members in a separate meeting between members of council and member Bridget Serrit, of the newly formed organization, Colorado Patient Rights Coalition
108 million patients and only a handful of you are or have been getting involved with the blatant disregard of our rights. This is going to affect you! Understand what it means! Get off of your asses and stand up for yourselves or bow down to your rights being stepped on by our local politicians. We all need to come together in force and show them that this will not be tolerated! Coming together in numbers will have greater impact and that is what it will take. This WILL happen in your town next, you need to be aware and know your rights as a patient.
Whether you grow or not, what can you do? First, research and familiarize yourselves with Amendment 20 and any laws regarding medical access in Colorado. Send emails to your local government officials that are implementing these laws. Call and leave them a brief, yet detailed message. Stand up for your rights! If you are available during the day, attend any protest about the matter that you see being advertised. Protests are being set up right now in Colorado Springs in front of Mayor Suthers office in Colorado Springs, on a monthly basis. The organization also has started a petition that as patients, you should sign.
https://www.facebook.com/events/266481020371172/https://www.change.org/p/colorado-state-house-keep-it-legal-coloradoIf you have paperwork to support your plant count recommendation, continue to grow that plant count. If police come to your home, DO NOT, under any circumstances, allow them access inside your home without a search warrant. DO NOT speak to the police. Record audio if they are in your home or at your door. DO NOT be swayed by the scare tactics they will try to use to get you to take a plea deal if you are arrested. You can and will win your case! It has been done! Now more than ever, is the time to get involved! Strength in numbers! Stand up!
In jail now for contempt of court, i can only hope that i will not be punished for thought, given my intent with this piece more or less to publicly scorn the same court and many of its agents represented here at the misnamed Criminal Justice Center of El Paso County. I will concentrate on this local example for specifics because of intimacy, but recent news and broad history supports my encouragement to the reader that (s)he extrapolate freely.
I’d almost rather sleep than pace around here like a tyger in a fucking zoo, but i am as i have been formed. I really don’t think you fuckers can make me sleep without some kind of assault. It’s possible a dispassionate observer might develop the notion that you can piss me off, so to speak, that you can make me blow my Zen, but no–that was i, and i’m over it already.
Here at the El Paso County Jail, called the “Criminal Justice Center,” uniforms abound and each, of course, conveys a message. All the prisoners are color coded. The deps and “specialists’ and nurses and “contractors” are all of a feather, some with fancier tails as it were, expressive of assorted specifics. Variation is for the most part strictly verboten, (sorry to misuse the language for such a purpose, T. You know what i mean.)
Prisoners are separated by severity of “crime,” degree of danger to self or others, and some by a certain degree of “privilege” (these are called “trusty”). Deputies are generally demarcated according to “authority.” Some have little shoulder insignia indicating rank, “honors,” or extreme pathology. “Civilians” in various “house nig…um…servant,” (ahem), positions bear yet further uniform garb, while certain haughty nabobs glide around in suits carrying clipboards, heads high, presumably to be the more able to reach the rarefied air that must sustain them with their pinched aquiline nostrils.
With irony that may or may not be intentional on someone or something’s part, the same uniforms described as so expressive also squelch some communication, which would be quite freely broadcast in ordinary circles. Certainly “club” colors are vigorously banned. Stuff like those placeholders for my ears. Some shit slips by: Many Department of Corrections guys, (prisoners), are recognizable by “penitentiary” labels on personal clothing. Haircuts, though highly imperfect at clarity, often show fondness for a martial life. The richest bearers of information of all apart from coded wristbands we wear under a pretty fair degree of duress are tattoos, freely and openly displayed by all but the besuited clipboard crowd.
The deputies have prevented me from wearing the little protective posts made of comb teeth i put in my ears, meant to keep the piercings from closing, as an experiment in boundaries, and as an expression of my identity; a bit of communication through appearance; silent aesthetic vocalization. One pleasant deputy said to me with great concern and chagrin in both his voice and his eyes, “Oh, no! This is terrible!” I asked him about his concern and he played it off as a joke; “Sarcasm.” But to me, “this”–that is, a bit of aesthetic experimentation that serves to announce my separation from a society i find abhorrent–is a marvelous thing, rich in multifaceted, radiating, information-bearing emanations. We all do these things, and some of us then wonder why we are rejected by those for whom we define ourselves as Other by those choices of appearance we make of our own volition.
No one can do anything about skin color, for example, and we ought not make assessments about human beings that are based on unchangeables like that, but we do anyhow. And life probably works out to support those assessments. Whether the differences are real or not, when two segments of society conspire to call one another’s members hateful names, like “nigger,” or “cracker,” or “Palestinian,” or “Jew,” the intonation of Otherness establishes a state of polarity where the prophecies inherent in the expression all become true, eventually. That’s pretty crazy in itself. At The El Paso County Jail the most desperate of prisoners–the mixed-color-teal-and-yellow crowd–are garbed thusly so that they are easily recognizable as homicidal-suicidal. They seem to live a miserable existence, isolated from everyone because of mutual fear, from which font their own dreaded behavior springs. The nurses in the medical unit where many of these saddest of souls reside sometimes and apart from regulation wear colors so similar that i have been startled by the spectacle of those shades in unexpected places. But i have had conversations with EPCO jail employees that went something like, “You should find something to do that doesn’t eat your soul.” “Oh, I’m fine–I get home and just forgetaboutit. Turn it off,” with a motion like flipping a switch. “Do you really think partitioning your personality–your life–your Self–to that degree so you won’t flip out is healthy!!? Isn’t that exactly how ‘multiples’ work things?” So just who are the crazy ones?
One deputy said to me, “Sixty to seventy percent of the cops in this town are just doing their jobs.” This is so multi-dimensionally wrong: Only a mental pathology allows a guy to perpetrate violence against an unwilling subject for a mundane paycheck that is derived in part from money confiscated from that very person being so victimized. This is deeply parasitic and also pretty fucking stupid in that biologically, the most successful parasite is one that works a symbiotic relationship with its host. The relationship of our government, (and virtually all governments), to its host our society is now and will soon prove to be catastrophically vitacidal. Meanwhile, what are the other forty percent doing? My estimation figures the best part of this minority is enjoying the sanction of the same gullible society to be violent for pay and false “honor.” Some of these two groups are actually deluded to imagine they are helping people.
“Can’t break the rules just doin’ my job nothin’ personal behind that blow to the head gotta paycheck to collect gotta family to feed….”
Assuredly history’s most spectacularly egregious crimes, and lest any reader seeks to comfort himself with false abstraction, those of this very day, this very moment, have always been committed beneath the false flag of “The Rules.”
I’ve heard it said in the context of “appearances” that the men and women of “Gateway” “represent El Paso County,” so that they are not permitted to wear a Mohawk, (or i suppose, bits of comb in their ears). Now, be alert that i am not a Gateway man, exactly, but i am here because of appearances, at least in part. To be clear, i don’t represent El Paso County, by any means and i give but the merest of fucks for appearances. I represent some higher Thing, and not by my choice at all; but having been chosen for this i serve my purpose while Judge Williams serves his. We are what we are, and what each of us represents is so far beyond El Paso County that i can’t see its apex from here and i suspect that Judge Williams has scarcely even apprehended its Its truth, having heard of these things only in forgotten dreams. I hope you aren’t hurt, dear Judge; these lots of ours are assigned, not chosen.
I certainly never meant to cause you harm, or even pain, though i can’t deny i have been quite angry; far more at your system than at you, personally. It’s up to you how much grief will be in this for you, but: Fear not, sir; for as i have said, this is all perfectly safe, And again: We are in this together. All of us. Like it or not.
*Submitted with respect to those EPCO Schindlers who struggle daily to avoid division by zero. And i’ll have to talk more about Gateway, later.
Pogo couldn’t have known the heft and resonance of his words: “We have met the enemy, and he is us.”
I wrote a screed a while back, (Today’s Tom Sawyer), excoriating shitty Christian behavior. There’s still plenty to say about all that, and maybe some of it will come out here, but it’s not the point of this one. During that earlier rant, i promised to harp, eventually, about bad behavior on the part of pagans, dope fiends, felons, bikers, disgruntled employees, GIs, vets, and some of my other natural affinity groups as well.
That isn’t it either. Or maybe it is. But not really. Not quite. I promised to write about the Fear, too, and nor is it that, though the Fear runs through it all. This is about a war.
Many members of of various of the groups on that funny little list i jotted just now recognize and will now openly state that there’s a war looming. They’re wrong about that much anyhow–the looming is all done and the fight is on. Right now. It’s been on for decades, (or maybe forever). I’m here “jotting” because that’s what one does in the county jail, where i am a political prisoner–a POW, really, though i prefer to think of myself as a prisoner of conscience–but maybe it’s a digression to say so. Or maybe not. Let’s explore this amalgam of notions a bit, and see if we can find out.
Here at the county jail one finds a peculiarly refined microcosm of the way the dynamics of the variously conflicting groups involved in this bizarre war interact, cleared of much of the dross of false civility that ordinarily circumvents the fight out on the sidewalk, at least here in the U.S.A.
I know Europeans here that want to skedaddle from this place and others afraid to come here because many of them can see the shitstorm brewing and it scares them. They often seem to see it more clearly than we Americans are able to do at least in part because our access to real news is barely over nil, of maybe because as outside observers they aren’t saddled with the cognitive dissonance we sorry brainwashed frogs that live in this hot-ass boiling lake must so often suffer. I don’t know. I hope they realize this pond holds us all.
Oddly enough, while the interactions at the county jail display some of the finer points of conflict in out absurdly labeled free society, they also show some reasons for hope. There are still lights burning.
“Fuck the Police!”
I don’t know how many times i’ve heard that phrase from some of my dearest friends. I’ve uttered them myself. Often. Sometimes at the top of my lungs. Sometimes it was far more personal: “Fuck you! That’s right, you, personally, whomever you may be in your opposition to me, my pursuits, my people. Maybe i should refer to the less common; “Fuck the Pigs,’ because the police are only a fractional representation of one segment, one camp of that particular overarching social entity the hippies were talking about when they began to disparage swine so badly as to label their opposition thusly in this odd existential war from whence the flesh and blood scrap derives.
“Battle lines are being drawn,” went the line from the Buffalo Springfield some fifty-ish years back. They’re pretty well drawn, now, though they resemble lines a three-year-old might scribble. The shit’s on. People are fighting. The skirmishes often feel like some kind of kids’ game though too, involving blindfolds and billyclubs. Maybe i can’t deny swinging a stick around myself, sometimes. Maybe that’swhat this is–a chance for me to look in the mirror a little, Maybe it’s because it’s hard to sit the game out when i keep getting hit in the head. Whatever. Let’s keep on through the maze and just hope we don’t smash too many mirrors.
During the Occupation we intrepids staged a few years back, (and some of us still engage–viva la revolución and all), my son and i traveled to Denver for the final push when the cops razed the encampment there. The scene that October of 2011 there in Denver was some shit this country hadn’t seen in over forty years maybe, where armored brigades of soldiers–not cops at all but stormtroopers–rolled on a huge, disparate group of unarmed citizens. It was tragic. And beautiful. Versions of the same scene played out all around the world that fall.
There at Civic Center Park, across the avenue from the State Capitol building, the Boy and i stood in the thick of it as those battle lines sharpened, and then blew apart as the whole outhouse hit the fan.
Some thousands of us had marched boisterously through Denver’s business district, pausing for a special visit at the Federal Reserve. After completing a wide loop around downtown we mounted the Capitol steps for whatever confrontation the Denver planners had planned. They, (to claim a thing–we), had been warned explicitly beforehand to stay off that particular edifice, so the moment we took the steps and began railing through one of our ubiquitous bullhorns, the shock teams appeared, as if the bearded-Spock Enterprise had beamed them to the scene.
Honestly, i was pretty fucking nervous at that point. It’s not as though i’d never been beaten up by the cops before, but that stuff is kind of a young man’s sport, and i was never really all that much a fan anyhow. Besides, those had always been cops, not armored sci-fi gladiators. But the main thing was the Boy. He was fifteen then and down for plenty, but he looked pretty worried too, and, (the mainthing, actually), i knew i’d never live through my next conversation with his mother if i allowed him to be beaten and busted by the police. I suggested we pull back to the park and we did, but i felt pretty spineless for having done it, really.
The Boy and i had a quick consult: “You see what this is going to be, right?” “Yeah.” “Are you down, or not?” Nervous but firm, “Yeah.” “Fuck it then…God damn it; your mom is gonna kill me. Let’s get some lunch.”
The park itself was packed with crowds of Occupiers, some having returned with us from the march and probably harboring thoughts similar to mine. The encampment had been there for a good while by then, and the Black Flag Anarchists’ Free Kitchen was in full flight. It had already been dismantled more than once as a special preparatory project for the cops–kind of a warm-up. Knowing well what was coming, the no-nonsense scrappy men’n’women in black behind the table were all assholes with elbows, flying around in a frenzy with grim serious joy in their eyes as they did their level best to sling as much great tasting free food as possible before the inevitable hammer fell. Those guys were freaking awesome sauce with motherfuckin’ cherries on top!
Rather than spark an actual and possibly justifiable war on the Capitol steps, even the most radical and adrenaline-blinded of the group holding that position chose to retreat and quickly joined us at the park. The scene was oddly festive, with tents and art projects and folks dressed for carnival. The mid-autumn day was one of those beautiful Colorado Indian summer affairs with pristine blue skies through which flitted happy and blissfully oblivious birdies merrily on the lookout for delectable kitchen scraps. But wait! What the hey!!? The second the steps were abandoned and that contingent joined those meeker souls at the park, the rest of the cops in the danged known universe materialized in a huff and began setting up for some sort of paramilitary invasion. No shit–we all saw pretty quickly what the Denver PD had in mind for all those fun military vehicles and equipment they’d been collecting.
The scene changed dramatically there on the sidewalk where the Anarchists’ Kitchen was set up. There was plenty of action before then, but the top-gun radicals had been at the Capitol along with most of the cops. Now a phalanx quickly formed four deep with armored, shielded, armed, dangerous, implacable, and apparently stoically unflappable police stretching all around, up and down–all over the fucking place. Where the Boy and i stood a few sidewalk squares south of the Kitchen the scene was still like a carnival spreading away and outward into the park in every direction save the east, buy more like something Ray Bradbury or John Clifford might have dreamt up. Moving east to west one would have passed through four rows of cops in a formation that i’d only seen before in movies about Fascist takeovers where American patriots saved the day by vanquishing some identically clad and positioned foe as we occupiers faced that day, armored only with our damn-the-torpedoes ethical certitude. Stepping by the entrenched police if one were to dare it, one would have passed a modest tree lawn, an ordinary sidewalk crowded with dark festival-goers, and could then step up to the folding table that served as the Anarchists’ ordering counter and serving table set up facing east from the immediate western line of the sidewalk across from the antiMayberry lines facing the stubbornly unaltered scene in the Kitchen.
The cops just stood there for what seems to memory like hours, but it couldn’t have been all afternoon or anything. Maybe so. The Boy and i milled around a bit getting a look at the overall scene and scoping out the various sections of the park. Behind the Kitchen to the west were the bulk of the tents, say a hundred or more, though others were scattered about. Further west a concrete round with maybe a fountain or something hosted a bunch of info tables, some artsy hippies working on various projects, a triage setup, some chanting Hare Krishnas. More cops surrounded the camp, even more moved to close off the farthest reaches of the west side, We all saw we were utterly circumscribed and our physical position was hopeless. There was plenty of Hope, mind you, but all of it founded on our spiritual position, see.
As we awaited what everyone knew to be inexorable, not so many of us remained quiet, (by “us” i mean Occupiers here; the most visible government employees were silent). I did mostly, and so did the Boy, he for his reasons and i for mine. The whole scene produced its own racket, but the most noticeable volume arose from the collection of spirit-moved Occupiers working the lines of eerily insensate gendarmes. Each was moved by his or her own personal spirit, few of which were very friendly toward the collective juggernaut we faced. More than one strode frenetically up and down whichever line was convenient hurling f-bombs and spittle with as much force as he could muster. You know: “Fuck the Police!!!” and,“Fuck Yoooou!!!” from distances as close as the collected officers’ gear would allow. The pointillistic rows of cops, each in his own world, stared into space, eyes forward and directed at some Unknown, refusing eye contact. Only God and each man in his solitude knew what blackness filled his vision, (and possibly anyone operating one of those guv’mint mind-reading gizmos, if you’re into that sort of thinking).
Sensibly, few of the “non-violent” protesters were mad–that is crazy–enough to attempt to get physical. Those that did were promptly stomped, smashed and removed from the game. Otherwise with many pushing the envelope right to its most extreme limit, the arms-down-and-rigid-face forward-inches-from-any-nearest-random-cop’s-shielded-face stance of extreme and barely checked agitation rapidly became familiar. I for one was amazed at the extraordinary and rather creepy restraint the beleaguered police were displaying, though few shield-screened eyes could keep from betraying internal turmoil. Virtually none of the cops would assent to eye contact.
As this scene played itself out, a few Occupiers attempted to convince their fellows to mellow. In the midst of the very front and most electrical line of all this, there in front of the aforementioned Kitchen, one lone Occupier was working the line of gear-laden men, moved by a different spirit indeed. He was preaching it, baby. Pleading. Begging. Beseeching. As near to tears as i am now as this scene spills its way from my fingertips, fluid in his expressive motion to and fro as any practiced Sunday morning crowd-pleaser can i get a amen. “Don’t you see it? You are us! We are you! Please, stop this! We are one–we must stop fighting!” And in some brilliant, divinely inspired voice, “Lay down your shields! Join us! Put down your clubs and have some lunch!”
And then …right there in front of the Boy and me…with the scene in the actual Kitchen production area behind the table unchanged from before the lines formed…one of them did exactly that.
There was actually a fat queue at the Kitchen counter that parted like the Red Sea, astonished, for this newborn brother of ours to step up and claim his serving. He ate his food in silence and retook his spot in that other line which remained unaltered as his fellows stood unmoved, apparently in both senses. The Boy and i collected our portion of genuinely bomb-ass risotto and began to eat with more on our minds than i can possibly describe. Before we were half through our plates the order came and we found ourselves dining amidst a police riot, our rice flavored by tear gas. (I got off the hook before, when the story remained vague. I suppose his mom is going to kill me now, after all).
The rest of the action went down as one would expect, with ample blood, outrage, and pepper-bullet injury and indignity and tears and drama. It was all on the news, with much expansion available on YouTube. You can look it up. None of that is the point.
I heard that one cop was fired perfunctorily that night.
We were there. Right fucking there. It really happened. It was so surreal i almost have to ask the Boy if it actually wasn’t some kind of dream.
Those two guys, though. That cop! When we all do what he did, just maybe then the war will be over. He looked up and noticed he was looking in the fucking mirror.
The thing about all this is that the crowd of Occupiers was a full-on quorum of average joes with representation across several spectra. There were Christians, pagans, dope fiends, felons, bikers, disgruntled employees, GIs, vets, blue-collar Barney Rubbles, Republicans, Democrats, hippies, neo-hippies, and chanting, jangling Hare Krishnas, The cops were disguised as an invading foreign force but we all know they were really just a bunch of Christians, pagans, dope fiends, felons, bikers, disgruntled employees, GIs, vets, blue-collar Barney Rubbles, Republicans, and Democrats. The only groups lacking representation really were the hippies and the chanting, jangling Hare Krishnas that stayed with the rest of us till late into the night serving free food as a replacement for the Anarchists who had been quite the hell shut down. Oh yeah–there likely weren’t too many Anarchists on the cops’ side of the lines. I’m pretty sure those differences are significant. Maybe the cops would be better if they got some of those groups they were missing. The janglier the better.
Back here at the county jail where i’m still Occupying, there’s lots of conflict, though not nearly so boiling hot. The old standby, “Fuck the Police,” is scrawled or carved around and about and plenty of folks on either side of whatever line each has drawn are fully prepared to swing clubs at one another. Many of the sheriff’s deputies and sad, paycheck-to paycheck “detention specialists” are happy to evoke a very dark spirit indeed in their efforts to control us inmates who represent Other to them. I have been struck by the observation that these obnoxious fucks are the respected representatives of a society that so many of our deluded citizenry expect us of the criminal class to emulate.
Ha! I may be an asshole myself, but no thanks: I have no interest in joining your obnoxious and shitty club.
Meanwhile, virtually all of us prisoners, including myself sometimes, react…”Grumble grumble fuck the police why i oughtta etc. etc. ad nauseum” Various of us slink around and steal or fight among ourselves or in general practice a sort of blindfolded subservience to Self. (Marco! Polo!…Ouch! Motherfucker!!!). We’re fucking obnoxious. We want the cops and the guards and judges and bankers and presidents to act differently but…why would they want to join our obnoxious and shitty club? When they do we wind up with a spectacular clusterfuck like the found at the Denver county jail last month, where a dep was helping a banger sling dope and administer beat-downs. Happens all the time. In every kaleidoscopic variation you can imagine.
Pogo couldn’t have known the heft and resonance of his words: “ We have met the enemy, and he is us.”
I wrote a screed a while back, (Today’s Tom Sawyer), excoriating shitty Christian behavior. There’s still plenty to say about all that, and maybe some of it will come out here, but it’s not the point of this one. During that earlier rant, i promised to harp, eventually, about bad behavior on the part of pagans, dope fiends, felons, bikers, disgruntled employees, GIs, vets, and some of my other natural affinity groups as well.
That isn’t it either. Or maybe it is. But not really. Not quite. I promised to write about the Fear, too, and nor is it that, though the Fear runs through it all. This is about a war.
Many members of of various of the groups on that funny little list i jotted just now recognize and will now openly state that there’s a war looming. They’re wrong about that much anyhow–the looming is all done and the fight is on. Right now. It’s been on for decades, (or maybe forever). I’m here “jotting” because that’s what one does in the county jail, where i am a political prisoner–a POW, really, though i prefer to think of myself as a prisoner of conscience–but maybe it’s a digression to say so. Or maybe not. Let’s explore this amalgam of notions a bit, and see if we can find out.
Here at the county jail one finds a peculiarly refined microcosm of the way the dynamics of the variously conflicting groups involved in this bizarre war interact, cleared of much of the dross of false civility that ordinarily circumvents the fight out on the sidewalk, at least here in the U.S.A.
I know Europeans here that want to skedaddle from this place and others afraid to come here because many of them can see the shitstorm brewing and it scares them. They often seem to see it more clearly than we Americans are able to do at least in part because our access to real news is barely over nil, of maybe because as outside observers they aren’t saddled with the cognitive dissonance we sorry brainwashed frogs that live in this hot-ass boiling lake must so often suffer. I don’t know. I hope they realize this pond holds us all.
Oddly enough, while the interactions at the county jail display some of the finer points of conflict in out absurdly labeled free society, they also show some reasons for hope. There are still lights burning.
“Fuck the Police!”
I don’t know how many times i’ve heard that phrase from some of my dearest friends. I’ve uttered them myself. Often. Sometimes at the top of my lungs. Sometimes it was far more personal: “Fuck you! That’s right, you, personally, whomever you may be in your opposition to me, my pursuits, my people. Maybe i should refer to the less common; “Fuck the Pigs,’ because the police are only a fractional representation of one segment, one camp of that particular overarching social entity the hippies were talking about when they began to disparage swine so badly as to label their opposition thusly in this odd existential war from whence the flesh and blood scrap derives.
“Battle lines are being drawn,” went the line from the Buffalo Springfield some fifty-ish years back. They’re pretty well drawn, now, though they resemble lines a three-year-old might scribble. The shit’s on. People are fighting. The skirmishes often feel like some kind of kids’ game though too, involving blindfolds and billyclubs. Maybe i can’t deny swinging a stick around myself, sometimes. Maybe that’swhat this is–a chance for me to look in the mirror a little, Maybe it’s because it’s hard to sit the game out when i keep getting hit in the head. Whatever. Let’s keep on through the maze and just hope we don’t smash too many mirrors.
During the Occupation we intrepids staged a few years back, (and some of us still engage–viva la revolución and all), my son and i traveled to Denver for the final push when the cops razed the encampment there. The scene that October of 2011 there in Denver was some shit this country hadn’t seen in over forty years maybe, where armored brigades of soldiers–not cops at all but stormtroopers–rolled on a huge, disparate group of unarmed citizens. It was tragic. And beautiful. Versions of the same scene played out all around the world that fall.
There at Civic Center Park, across the avenue from the State Capitol building, the Boy and i stood in the thick of it as those battle lines sharpened, and then blew apart as the whole outhouse hit the fan.
Some thousands of us had marched boisterously through Denver’s business district, pausing for a special visit at the Federal Reserve. After completing a wide loop around downtown we mounted the Capitol steps for whatever confrontation the Denver planners had planned. They, (to claim a thing–we), had been warned explicitly beforehand to stay off that particular edifice, so the moment we took the steps and began railing through one of our ubiquitous bullhorns, the shock teams appeared, as if the bearded-Spock Enterprise had beamed them to the scene.
Honestly, i was pretty fucking nervous at that point. It’s not as though i’d never been beaten up by the cops before, but that stuff is kind of a young man’s sport, and i was never really all that much a fan anyhow. Besides, those had always been cops, not armored sci-fi gladiators. But the main thing was the Boy. He was fifteen then and down for plenty, but he looked pretty worried too, and, (the mainthing, actually), i knew i’d never live through my next conversation with his mother if i allowed him to be beaten and busted by the police. I suggested we pull back to the park and we did, but i felt pretty spineless for having done it, really.
The Boy and i had a quick consult: “You see what this is going to be, right?” “Yeah.” “Are you down, or not?” Nervous but firm, “Yeah.” “Fuck it then…God damn it; your mom is gonna kill me. Let’s get some lunch.”
The park itself was packed with crowds of Occupiers, some having returned with us from the march and probably harboring thoughts similar to mine. The encampment had been there for a good while by then, and the Black Flag Anarchists’ Free Kitchen was in full flight. It had already been dismantled more than once as a special preparatory project for the cops–kind of a warm-up. Knowing well what was coming, the no-nonsense scrappy men’n’women in black behind the table were all assholes with elbows, flying around in a frenzy with grim serious joy in their eyes as they did their level best to sling as much great tasting free food as possible before the inevitable hammer fell. Those guys were freaking awesome sauce with motherfuckin’ cherries on top!
Rather than spark an actual and possibly justifiable war on the Capitol steps, even the most radical and adrenaline-blinded of the group holding that position chose to retreat and quickly joined us at the park. The scene was oddly festive, with tents and art projects and folks dressed for carnival. The mid-autumn day was one of those beautiful Colorado Indian summer affairs with pristine blue skies through which flitted happy and blissfully oblivious birdies merrily on the lookout for delectable kitchen scraps. But wait! What the hey!!? The second the steps were abandoned and that contingent joined those meeker souls at the park, the rest of the cops in the danged known universe materialized in a huff and began setting up for some sort of paramilitary invasion. No shit–we all saw pretty quickly what the Denver PD had in mind for all those fun military vehicles and equipment they’d been collecting.
The scene changed dramatically there on the sidewalk where the Anarchists’ Kitchen was set up. There was plenty of action before then, but the top-gun radicals had been at the Capitol along with most of the cops. Now a phalanx quickly formed four deep with armored, shielded, armed, dangerous, implacable, and apparently stoically unflappable police stretching all around, up and down–all over the fucking place. Where the Boy and i stood a few sidewalk squares south of the Kitchen the scene was still like a carnival spreading away and outward into the park in every direction save the east, buy more like something Ray Bradbury or John Clifford might have dreamt up. Moving east to west one would have passed through four rows of cops in a formation that i’d only seen before in movies about Fascist takeovers where American patriots saved the day by vanquishing some identically clad and positioned foe as we occupiers faced that day, armored only with our damn-the-torpedoes ethical certitude. Stepping by the entrenched police if one were to dare it, one would have passed a modest tree lawn, an ordinary sidewalk crowded with dark festival-goers, and could then step up to the folding table that served as the Anarchists’ ordering counter and serving table set up facing east from the immediate western line of the sidewalk across from the antiMayberry lines facing the stubbornly unaltered scene in the Kitchen.
The cops just stood there for what seems to memory like hours, but it couldn’t have been all afternoon or anything. Maybe so. The Boy and i milled around a bit getting a look at the overall scene and scoping out the various sections of the park. Behind the Kitchen to the west were the bulk of the tents, say a hundred or more, though others were scattered about. Further west a concrete round with maybe a fountain or something hosted a bunch of info tables, some artsy hippies working on various projects, a triage setup, some chanting Hare Krishnas. More cops surrounded the camp, even more moved to close off the farthest reaches of the west side, We all saw we were utterly circumscribed and our physical position was hopeless. There was plenty of Hope, mind you, but all of it founded on our spiritual position, see.
As we awaited what everyone knew to be inexorable, not so many of us remained quiet, (by “us” i mean Occupiers here; the most visible government employees were silent). I did mostly, and so did the Boy, he for his reasons and i for mine. The whole scene produced its own racket, but the most noticeable volume arose from the collection of spirit-moved Occupiers working the lines of eerily insensate gendarmes. Each was moved by his or her own personal spirit, few of which were very friendly toward the collective juggernaut we faced. More than one strode frenetically up and down whichever line was convenient hurling f-bombs and spittle with as much force as he could muster. You know: “Fuck the Police!!!” and,“Fuck Yoooou!!!” from distances as close as the collected officers’ gear would allow. The pointillistic rows of cops, each in his own world, stared into space, eyes forward and directed at some Unknown, refusing eye contact. Only God and each man in his solitude knew what blackness filled his vision, (and possibly anyone operating one of those guv’mint mind-reading gizmos, if you’re into that sort of thinking).
Sensibly, few of the “non-violent” protesters were mad–that is crazy–enough to attempt to get physical. Those that did were promptly stomped, smashed and removed from the game. Otherwise with many pushing the envelope right to its most extreme limit, the arms-down-and-rigid-face forward-inches-from-any-nearest-random-cop’s-shielded-face stance of extreme and barely checked agitation rapidly became familiar. I for one was amazed at the extraordinary and rather creepy restraint the beleaguered police were displaying, though few shield-screened eyes could keep from betraying internal turmoil. Virtually none of the cops would assent to eye contact.
As this scene played itself out, a few Occupiers attempted to convince their fellows to mellow. In the midst of the very front and most electrical line of all this, there in front of the aforementioned Kitchen, one lone Occupier was working the line of gear-laden men, moved by a different spirit indeed. He was preaching it, baby. Pleading. Begging. Beseeching. As near to tears as i am now as this scene spills its way from my fingertips, fluid in his expressive motion to and fro as any practiced Sunday morning crowd-pleaser can i get a amen. “Don’t you see it? You are us! We are you! Please, stop this! We are one–we must stop fighting!” And in some brilliant, divinely inspired voice, “Lay down your shields! Join us! Put down your clubs and have some lunch!”
And then …right there in front of the Boy and me…with the scene in the actual Kitchen production area behind the table unchanged from before the lines formed…one of them did exactly that.
There was actually a fat queue at the Kitchen counter that parted like the Red Sea, astonished, for this newborn brother of ours to step up and claim his serving. He ate his food in silence and retook his spot in that other line which remained unaltered as his fellows stood unmoved, apparently in both senses. The Boy and i collected our portion of genuinely bomb-ass risotto and began to eat with more on our minds than i can possibly describe. Before we were half through our plates the order came and we found ourselves dining amidst a police riot, our rice flavored by tear gas. (I got off the hook before, when the story remained vague. I suppose his mom is going to kill me now, after all).
The rest of the action went down as one would expect, with ample blood, outrage, and pepper-bullet injury and indignity and tears and drama. It was all on the news, with much expansion available on YouTube. You can look it up. None of that is the point.
I heard that one cop was fired perfunctorily that night.
We were there. Right fucking there. It really happened. It was so surreal i almost have to ask the Boy if it actually wasn’t some kind of dream.
Those two guys, though. That cop! When we all do what he did, just maybe then the war will be over. He looked up and noticed he was looking in the fucking mirror.
The thing about all this is that the crowd of Occupiers was a full-on quorum of average joes with representation across several spectra. There were Christians, pagans, dope fiends, felons, bikers, disgruntled employees, GIs, vets, blue-collar Barney Rubbles, Republicans, Democrats, hippies, neo-hippies, and chanting, jangling Hare Krishnas, The cops were disguised as an invading foreign force but we all know they were really just a bunch of Christians, pagans, dope fiends, felons, bikers, disgruntled employees, GIs, vets, blue-collar Barney Rubbles, Republicans, and Democrats. The only groups lacking representation really were the hippies and the chanting, jangling Hare Krishnas that stayed with the rest of us till late into the night serving free food as a replacement for the Anarchists who had been quite the hell shut down. Oh yeah–there likely weren’t too many Anarchists on the cops’ side of the lines. I’m pretty sure those differences are significant. Maybe the cops would be better if they got some of those groups they were missing. The janglier the better.
Back here at the county jail where i’m still Occupying, there’s lots of conflict, though not nearly so boiling hot. The old standby, “Fuck the Police,” is scrawled or carved around and about and plenty of folks on either side of whatever line each has drawn are fully prepared to swing clubs at one another. Many of the sheriff’s deputies and sad, paycheck-to paycheck “detention specialists” are happy to evoke a very dark spirit indeed in their efforts to control us inmates who represent Other to them. I have been struck by the observation that these obnoxious fucks are the respected representatives of a society that so many of our deluded citizenry expect us of the criminal class to emulate.
Ha! I may be an asshole myself, but no thanks: I have no interest in joining your obnoxious and shitty club.
Meanwhile, virtually all of us prisoners, including myself sometimes, react…”Grumble grumble fuck the police why i oughtta etc. etc. ad nauseum” Various of us slink around and steal or fight among ourselves or in general practice a sort of blindfolded subservience to Self. (Marco! Polo!…Ouch! Motherfucker!!!). We’re fucking obnoxious. We want the cops and the guards and judges and bankers and presidents to act differently but…why would they want to join our obnoxious and shitty club? When they do we wind up with a spectacular clusterfuck like the found at the Denver county jail last month, where a dep was helping a banger sling dope and administer beat-downs. Happens all the time. In every kaleidoscopic variation you can imagine.
Although those of you that have read or will now read the other stuff here on hipgnosis will easily recognize the common ground that one may imagine stands to be found on the lawns inside the moats of our adjacent castles in a neighborhood full of loons, all built on air, i am deeply indebted to Ian Caldwell and Dustin Thomason for some of the truly fine and beautiful language i snatched more or less wholesale to help me build the last four paragraphs here. Even though their book,The Rule of Four is a best-seller of a popular genre, i highly recommend it as the best book i’ve read produced during the twenty-first century. I wish i had written it myself, (while noting the title of this piece). Everyone should read this book.
Nearly three years ago, Steven Bass’ tent led to a police ticket – a ticket that led to a trial, an appeal denied and 160-day sentence in El Paso County jail.
Bass, the first person cited under Colorado Springs’ camping ban, remains mired in a legal battle backed by a University of Denver assistant professor working for free.
He represents a small segment of the homeless issue – a man on a personal crusade against the camping ban emboldened by the Occupy Colorado Springs movement. His case is not emblematic of others who have been cited for camping on public property; rather, it is more of an outlier.
While people ticketed for camping typically include the chronically homeless – people whose only home is a tent, and who often rebuff police officers’ offers of secure housing – Bass wants to make a point.
Right now, he is free while appealing the jail time. Bass lives with a fellow veteran of the Occupy movement and blogs occasionally on what he sees as injustices in the world.
“I contend now that this thing has burgeoned well beyond the camping ban itself, and has now become a giant discussion of principle, and just what the hell we’re doing here in the United States of America, and the whole world,” Bass said.
Police issued the ticket in October 2011 when he pitched a tent on a sidewalk in Acacia Park, despite warnings from police that doing so would lead to a citation.
For Bass, the ticket and the Occupy gathering proved an opportune time for a stand against the city’s camping ban – an ordinance passed by the City Council in 2010 that outlawed camping on public land. He said he has volunteered at soup kitchens and for other homeless services for about 30 years, and he lives homeless – usually by couch surfing.
“Just because they don’t have any money, poof, they are made criminals,” Bass said of people affected by the ban.
Eleven tickets have been issued under the ban through June 5, with the majority coming in 2014, according to the Colorado Springs Police Department.
The ban came as camps swelled along Monument and Fountain creeks amid the Great Recession in 2009 and early 2010. So many people lived there that bystanders dropped off donated food and clothing along the creek beds – philanthropy that proved overwhelming to the point of concern, some homeless advocates say. Sanitation issues also arose.
City Council member Jan Martin said she voted for the ordinance for the safety of people using creekside trails, along with concerns about the image that such tent cities would create for the city, she said Friday. Proponents of the ban said it is a tool to get people into more stable housing.
“In my opinion, it’s not a matter of out of sight, out of mind,” Martin said. “It’s just trying to find resources that can help people get back on their feet.”
Because of Bass’ indigent status, a judge decided against a fine in favor of a 60-hour community service sentence for the citation.
Bass said he almost did it – he planned on helping Pikes Peak Habitat for Humanity – until a DU professor offered to help. With the pro bono advice of Christopher Lasch, who teaches at the university’s Criminal Defense Clinic, Bass appealed the case.
A district court judge upheld the municipal court’s decision – a blow to the notion that the ban is unjust.
A subsequent appeal to the Colorado Supreme Court was denied in March, said Rob McCallum, spokesman for the Colorado Judicial Branch.
Through it all, Bass contemplated his 60-hour of community service sentence. And in an April hearing before Municipal Judge Spottswood W. H. Williams, Bass said he will never complete the requirement.
Identifying himself as an Occupier, Bass wrote to Williams that the camping ordinance is “effectively status-based incarceration,” because forcing people into shelters could be another form of incarceration. He also said he already does community service but railed against the court forcing him to do so.
“Therefore, i (sic) am here in front of you forcing your hand,” he wrote. “You must now either acknowledge the ethical poverty of the ordinance, or prove my point.”
In June, Williams answered Bass’ statement with a 160-day jail sentence for contempt of court.
Bass is appealing that sentence with Lasch’s help after having served more than a month in El Paso County jail.
Lasch said the jail sentence was excessive because jail time for failing to pay a fine is usually half of what Bass has served.
Even if he serves all 160 days, Bass has no plans of completing the 60-hour community service order – a requirement that remains.
Lasch wants all of it thrown out.
“The fact that the government would go to such lengths to punish this activity certainly supports Steve’s position that this (ban) effectively punishes being homeless,” Lasch said.
“In this case, it certainly punished him for speaking out against the ban.”
Its the bitter watches of the night and I wake. I ask myself what it is that has rousted me this day from my slumber. Its not near my body clock’s time of 4am…. There is a wailing in my mind and I must ask myself “whose pain is this?” for I know it is not mine. My body is aching with the storm on the peak, but I’d just found my center and there was no wail with in me like this to speak.
So trying not to wake the other in my bed, I sit quietly and listen to see what it is this wailing voice has come to seek. Its victims so many victims… victims of war, hungry ghosts of a corrupt system, victims of the human butchers and legal poison vendors, victims of industry and victims of hard work, being eaten alive by cancer and bodily disorder of so many shapes and forms it makes me shudder in vibration with this wail. And within me I hold an answer for so many a gift from above that I try to spread without regard to a patient station in life….. It is a wail of responsibility. It is a wail of the profiteer’s victims. It is the wail of prohibitions ugly head……
I light a candle to guard my heart from a wailing so deep in the thick of the night and I still listen to the voice in my mind reminding me of their plight. I sit a while with the lamb in my breath asking that higher than I to step in and take this wail up with my smoke to the sky. I ask for the means to bless those wailing with even a few grams of healing and hope cause I believe in doing what my creator said. And I know that this life and this path I have chosen for myself has never been easy but its not about self.
I give honor to the earth. I burn sacred sage of the earth and cleanse the darkness from my mind until light only remains. I light incense and honor the air. More candles glow and I honor the firey spirit of the soul and I soak in salted and perfumed waters and try to scrub away the victimization of these beautiful souls. Lambs breath fills my pipe and lungs and mind and I try to send a shining beacon of the creators light to these wailing in my mind and in the dark and in their own lives and pain… Dressed for the day I inhale organic tobacco and ponder quietly.
Then another presence comes upon my mind…. and I am taken back though the years and back in time. To a place and time where my body was not constantly sore…. Its boulder its Ginsberg its 1994. Its a little bookish Jewish dude who howled for his time and who brought me to his feet to sit for a time… You see he was my own personal poet willy wonka who saw a bit of my poetry and brought me on up to the Naropa factory to sit at his feet for the anniversary of his beloved school. It was Allen Ginsberg day in Boulder and I was with the master and yet a child myself….. I remember how he opened my eyes and smoked a blended herbal cigarette with me in an intermission…..
What dreams I have of you tonight Allen Ginsberg as you dreamed of Walt Whitman…. with sick people wailing in the night and my soul howling at the moon of my own inner madness.
I wonder where you are tonight while I feel so small and so responsible. I imagine you my zen master in your own nirvana or perhaps your here again in another body and another life… But from wherever you are I seem to hear your voice reminding me of the power of my pen and of the ideals to which you and I both try to keep. You wanted freedom of the plant and so do I. I’m trying to be a willy wonka for others where you were willy wonks for I… and so my musings and prayers and light intercessions complete I turn to what I can do for those wailing from where I am and put actions to the light that I keep.
And so I begin to wail for these folks online saying with my writers voice and my mighty pen:
I begin with this blessing: Virtual early Sunday morning tokes to all of the Rastafarian sacramental strain lambs breath. For me this strain quiets fears and calms my mind. It clears my mind and puts me in a space where i can enter my creators holy throne room with gratitude and peace instead of chaos and turmoil. It makes me still enough to hear the still small voice of my soul. It points me to currents and springs of strength and reminds me of the good i do. All of this i have for me i extend to you virtually and in energy and prayer.
Note***** There are two sacramental strains to the Rastafarian religion. One is called Lamb’s bread (I have never had the pleasure of smoking this strain) and it is said to have cola’s so large that the buds are sliced up like slices of bread. This is said to be more for dancing and rejoicing before the Lamb. Lamb’s breath is characterized by smaller dense highly resinous buds that are mellow, mind clearing and good for quiet contemplation.
I am still looking for new raw material sources to meet demand. I will pay $100 a pound for quality trim. I know a lot of you usually process your own trim but who cant use an extra few dollars around the holidays that the transaction goes to save lives? Call 719 480 0238. you must be in Colorado. I need bulk i need it quick.
I will travel anywhere in the state and negotiate on price for the right weight of the right stuff. I need trim that bad. I am trying to get people served as quickly as possible while longer term sources Relationships are in the works. Call 719 480 0238. A portion of any and all trim purchased goes to provide free phoenix tears to those in need that is why i need good prices. To put goodies into financially challenged cancer and severe illness folks hands. Lets get those free folks their Christmas presents and the paid folks what they deserve. It will make you feel good to give some people tears of joy.
The rest of you who cannot help with actions you may offer you energy to the task. Never underestimate the power of prayer in intercession for someone else. If we focus good vibes on those free peeps and paid peeps their lives can improve exponentially by far more than me just getting Their oil delivered to them. I invite you to join me in that intention…. No, i challenge you to.
Where is the heart that used to beat in this state for the less fortunate? Have you all gone mad with greed? I am willing to pay a fair price so i can give meds away for free. Will no one support me in that cause? Are you all so rich you can laugh at thousands of dollars? Are you all so unmoved by the plight of the less fortunate? Is there no one who believes in me filling hands where mine once needed filled? No one thinks its good to repay kindness by paying it forward to others?
I just gotta get these people taken care of. For some it means hope to try for another year. There is a couple who lives on the street. One partner has bone cancer and has all but given up. When my oil is there they live as good as they can and enjoy what life they have. Without the oil bone cancer boy gives up. They cant pay and i don’t care. I wanna give them both some hope and quality of life.
There is a writer whom many respect respect within our community whose belly aches him to no end and he cant sleep among other serious issues that are more private. He works hard for our cause but cant afford oil. He is the very picture of a starving writer and artist with a good soul and I wanna get him some rest and comfort so he can continue to serve us all so well.
There is an awesome bud-tend who works for far less than he is worth. The shop he works for sells oil yet it is out of his price range. A grain of rice a day would stop him from needing a diabetic needle yet his pancreas is far overworked. I wanna be sure he can keep giving patients the strains they need with the brain in his head. I have never left his shop with anything other than a strain to treat exactly the conditions I am concerned about that day mostly due to his knowledge that keeps a wide variety of strains for a wide variety of ailments on the shelves and getting into the right hands.
There are Numerous ladies and gents with tumors praying to avoid chemo and folks hoping not to need their noses scraped off their faces Who cant pay and need mercy. How can anyone deny the value of what i”m trying to accomplish? will no one sell me the raw materials i need to enrich these lives. I have shared but the tip of the iceberg.
Someone calls these folks I’m trying to help jewels in my crown. I bristle at the suggestion. I don’t care about jewels in my crown. If the creator blesses me as such that is incidental. I give because i know need better than most and to repay the kindnesses done for me by good people when i had nothing.
I do it because someone needs to and far too many are far too concerned with profit. I do it because these are victims of a corrupt system each and everyone in one way or another.
And i do it because it is in my nature to do it. And to make my murdered son proud of me from where he sits waiting on me in the afterlife and to make his wait have meaning. Help me make these sick people’s wait have meaning too.
So if you have some trim and a heart call me at 719 480 0238 And lets bless some people together. If you have a heart and no trim please just keep these good folks in your thoughts and prayers or however you communicate with the universe offer some strength in the direction of one or more of these people. Don’t direct it at me please. The sick need your love and light far more than i do.
I ask again! Where is the heart that used to beat in this state for the less fortunate? Have you all gone mad with greed? I am willing to pay a fair price so i can give meds away for free. Will no one support me in that cause? Are you all so rich you can laugh at thousands of dollars? Are you all so unmoved by the plight of the less fortunate? Is there no one who believes in me filling hands where mine once needed filled? No one thinks its good to repay kindness by paying it forward to others?
And so I move from being woke in the night, to prayer, to action trying to get some help to those who need it most. Won’t you please help me? I want to buy raw materials to make them medicine. That’s all.
Some Raw Materials images purchased after this post:
This is some sugar out of one of our big bags of trim
virtual tokes from my bag to your bowl….. some bud from an oil making bag of raw materials that came from an awesome friend — in Denver, CO.
You Can’t see my pain with your eyes. The only thing that relieves my pain is Cannabis! You could never imagine the pain I suffer, yet you deny me my freedom.
I’d like to speak to Colorado for a moment and it’s voters…. I feel I must leave you with the following thoughts regarding how you cast your vote on the Amendment 64 issue in a few days.
For the record, I STILL do NOT SUPPORT COLORADO CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT 64Corporate Greed IS NOT LEGAL WEED! Vote NO on Colorado State Constitutional Amendment 64! (or at least read the damn bill and see how corporate minded it is and then make up your mind…. don’t listen to the pamphlets or the tv spots… trust your own reasoning after reading the LANGUAGE you are making yourself subject to!)….. Read the bill and think about who they wrote the bill to benefit… their own freaking pocketbooks, that’s who… read the text of the AMMENDMENT (provided in red letters at the link https://kiefair.com/2012/04/15/colorado-canna-relief-or-cannabis-like-alcohol-you-decide/ ) and then decide how to vote… don’t just think “YAY legal weed” and vote… you’re not getting what you think you are babies!
The bill that is written to serve those who already have money (dispensary owners wanting to convert to party stores to sell to recreational users and stop dealing with us “difficult” sick people). If you read the bills closely, it is really easy to see whom they were written to serve…. the Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol serves those already deep in the industry and keeps the grows in corporate hands…. I believe the recreational users should be allowed to grow. It’s just a plant….. When people see the shackles and chains
slapped on them by this bill in reality (the words put into practice) people are going to be just as pissed about these regulations as they are about the regs under hb-1284/sb-109
Effective January 1, 2012, the Registry will no longer accept Food Stamp and Supplemental Security Income letters as proof of low-income status.
Patients with a household income that is 185% of the Federal Poverty Level or less, qualify for fee waiver. The chart below indicates the annual household incomes, adjusted for family size, that qualify.
Household incomes at 185% of 2012 Federal Poverty Guidelines*
# in Family
Annual Income
1
$20,664.50
2
$27,990.50
3
$35,316.50
4
$42,642.50
5
$49,968.50
6
$57,294.50
7
$64,620.50
8
$71,946.50
Each Additional
$ 7,067.00
Source: Federal Register, Vol 75, No. 17, January 26, 2012, ppl 4034-4035
*Poverty guidelines are updated periodically in the Federal Register by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services under the authority of 42 U.S.C. 9902(2)
To apply for a Fee Waiver/Tax Exempt Status, patients must:
1. Request a certified copy of their most current State tax returnfrom the Department of Revenue. Tax returns must be within the last two years to qualify. Patients can request a certified copy of their tax return by completing form DR-5714 ‘Request for Copy of Tax Returns’ available atwww.colorado.gov/cms/forms/dor-tax/dr5714.pdf. The form must be completed, notarized and sent to the Colorado Department of Revenue for processing.
2. Complete form MMR1010 Request for Fee Waiver/Tax-Exempt Status.1010.pdf.
3. Send the Request for Fee Waiver/Tax-Exempt Status form and the certified copy of the most current State tax return with the patient’s application.
4. Patients who already have a Medical Marijuana Registration Card, may submit form MMR 1010 and a copy of their certified State tax return to have their card status modified to “Tax Exempt.”
You Can’t see my pain with your eyes. The only thing that relieves my pain is Cannabis! You could never imagine the pain I suffer, yet you deny me my freedom. Image by: The Art of Breezy Kiefair for the Reefer Gurl Facebook page
as always, thank you for your time and attention in reading this.
twitter
@breezykiefairbio of breezy:
the short 4 page version: http://www.scribd.com/doc/64585079/My-Personal-Christmas-Present-to-thethe more in depth, needs editing, 31 page version to help you understand why i sit at my machine fighting the machine day in and day out.http://www.scribd.com/doc/64585829/%E2%80%9CA-Long-Strange-Journey-of-1-Cannabis-Patient%E2%80%99s-Colorado-Cannabis-Activsm%E2%80%9D-or-%E2%80%9CAll-About-Breezy-Kiefair~ Do all that you can to cultivate peace within yourself, that it might
shine out from you, and plant the seed of peace in other spirits, for them
to cultivate.~{Remember… it is when we choose act on the issues that are in front of
our faces, when we choose to get involved instead of looking the other way
as our fellow man struggles, when we choose to take those small simple
little actions, working on righting little wrongs in our everyday lives that
really make change happen, those seemingly small actions are what really
make the world a better place and are a catalyst for greater social change.}
~Both quotes by Breedheen “Bree” O’Rilley Keefer~
A Heart Filled with love is like a phoenix that no cage can imprison ~Rumi
There is a cure for cancer and we are here to help you in your pursuit of life.
What if there is an answer to Cancer?
What if doctors already had the knowledge to cure cancer? What if that answer to cancer was a plant easily grown both indoors and out. These are not hypothetical “what if’s” There is an answer to cancer, that answer is Phoenix Tears.
What Are Phoenix Tears?
Quite simply, Phoenix Tears are a potent, concentrated form of the cannabis plant. This therapy is also known as R.S.O (Rick Simpson Oil), CannabisCure Oil, Run From the Cure Oil, F.E.C.O (Fully Extracted Cannabis Oil), Ronnie Smith Oil, Jamaican Hash Oil (like you used to get “back in the day”) Cannabis extract, or simply hash oil. Whatever you call it, it is strong medicine that cures most cancers and can treat many disorders/diseases in the body.
Have Questions? You are Not Alone…
I hope I can offer you a few answers about Cannabis Cure Oil
I get a lot of questions about Phoenix Tears Therapy from people who know very little about cannabis or the healing process with Phoenix Tears Therapy. Therefore, I have decided to provide some information here on the blog to make it easier for everyone.
If you do not know what phoenix tears are or that they cure cancer, or have never heard that cannabis oil can treat and cure a wide variety of diseases, please take time to acquaint yourself with the following information/videos. I have made every attempt to quote my sources wherever appropriate.
2 ounces of oil, eaten over a 90-day time period is the cure for most cancers. For some patients,it takes less oil/duration of therapy, for others, it takes more. If a patient can tolerate the psychoactive effects of the medication, they should eat as much as they can as quickly as they can.
As the documentary explains, cannabis grew prolifically during ancient times and is thought to be mankind’s firs cultivated plant. Whether it was ground up and used as an ancient ingredient or simply eaten whole, marijuana was thought to be a component of ancient man’s diet, as well as one of his most trusted tools. As recently as the 1940’s, the US government grew marijuana over hundreds of acres and used it to make the ropes on America’s naval warships during World War 2.
In the 1800’s, medical journals published more than one hundred articles touting the benefits and uses of marijuana. The film insists that during the days of house-call-making doctors, marijuana was a part of every physician’s medical bag. One of the most widely prescribed treatments by doctors a century and a half ago, it was used to counter complaints such as labor pains, asthma, rheumatism, nervous disorders, colic in babies and menstrual cramps.
Today, even with the limited testing allowed by the world’s governments, marijuana is inspiring new medical discoveries and unlocking the mysteries of the human body. Some of the quotes put forth in the documentary by experts in the medical marijuana field include, “This group of chemicals has significant anti-tumor properties”, “Cannabis kills cancer cells, in many cases”, “They have anti-tumor effects” and “We know that it kills cancer cells without hurting the non-transformed cells”.
The documentary goes on to remind viewers that marijuana has already been proven to have anti-inflammatory, anti-spasmodic and anti-bacterial properties – some of the most pharmaceutically-prescribed ailments in America today. The plant’s chemical effects have also proved to safely and successfully treat depression, traumatic stress syndrome, chronic pain, glaucoma, migraine headaches, multiple sclerosis, turrets, nausea and more – all without the deadly and dangerous side effects accompanying pharmaceutical drugs.
What if there is an answer to Cancer Video Playlist
At the below link, you will find a youtube playlist of pro-Phoenix Tears therapy/medicinal cannabis videos regarding cancer and other diseases for all them Marijana Men and Reefer Gurls out there as well as for all those poor souls stuck needing Gardening Tips for the Medically Damned because their bodies are falling apart. The Art of Breezy Kiefair includes the healing arts. I have been working on expanding this post to include further details and resources because the initial post was so well received. I thank you for your kind shares and likes on this post. It is my sincerest hope that this does answer some questions for people. If you have a video suggestion to add to the list, please let me know (the list is in no way complete, I am just running out of strength for the day). If you have a question that I missed, please ask it on the post so that all may benefit from whatever answer I may be able to dig up. Thanks again all my friends, fans and fiends. Virtual tokes to those who need them, and as always, have a blessed day. (added 11/1/2012)
Most of the evidence available about this amazing treatment is anecdotal, however the visual images of the healing are stunning and hard to ignore, even when it is the lowly lab mouse showing us what it can do.
_______________________________
Have Questions? You are Not Alone…
I hope I can offer you a few answers about Cannabis Cure Oil
I get a lot of questions about Phoenix Tears Therapy from people who know very little about cannabis or the healing process with Phoenix Tears Therapy. Therefore, I have decided to provide some information here on the blog to make it easier for everyone.
If you do not know what phoenix tears are or that they cure cancer, or have never heard that cannabis oil can treat and cure a wide variety of diseases, please take time to acquaint yourself with the following information/videos. I have made every attempt to quote my sources wherever appropriate.
2 ounces of oil, eaten over a 90-day time period is the cure for most cancers. For some patients,it takes less oil/duration of therapy, for others, it takes more. If a patient can tolerate the psychoactive effects of the medication, they should as much as they can as quickly as they can.
_______________________________
Let’s begin with a bit of my personal cancer history
_______________________________
anyone else notice the big lump on the left? look just above the leaves over my shoulder. It began as a lump behind my left ear the ulcer on the top of the head has been there off and on since I was about 9 years old… it would heal up and reopen unexpectedly years later. there is a cure for cancer… how many beautiful women need butchered because doctors wanna run from the cure for the sake of monetary gain… are you curious about the cure?
I have a genetic disorder that gives me an extremely high tolerance, and I ate 4-10 grams a day for about a month and cured my cancer. VERY few individuals can tolerate that much oil that quickly. It is not going to kill you no matter how much you take (given that the tears have been made properly and no solvents remain). Most people just can’t take as much as I did and function on any level. I am a unique case on several levels, so my path and speed down that path need not be yours. You know your own body better than anyone else does (with the exception of your understanding of a creator if you have one.) You should be your own judge of what your body needs.
I am not a doctor or licensed herbalist. I am just a lady who has travelled this path trying to offer information to other people considering walking down this path of their own free will.
I fought with myself for a long time about even going to a doctor. MY FREE WILL said that a doctor visit is only a diagnostic tool…. I knew I would not be allowing any cutting… I would not be allowing any chemo… I seriously doubted I’d even submit to imaging (radiation of its own). Another part of me thought that perhaps I would find some benefit from seeing a western medicine doctor for my cancer… I have had it 3 times before… Still, it was not as if I did not know what I was in for…. I make the cure… I’m was left wondering what to do or to think about it, and it was torture for me and everyone I am connected with…. I made up my own damn mind as always (would you expect anything less?) but, took wise take counsel in many forms before coming to a decision… I hate doctors with a passion, but for the good of my sanity and those around me, I went to the doctor. He said “malignant”, and I went home to eat oil.
I began using the phoenix tears therapy in November 2011 ( 1 drop – 1/4 gram of cannabis oil per day) to aid in the agony that had been diagnosed as “fibromyalgia” (a misdiagnosis, but we will get to that part of the tale later) Even before I went in to see the doctor, I had been stepping up my dosing of phoenix tears from my previous dosing.
my mission for the day? do good and try to heal my own body (we have not gone into a doc, but the phoenix tears is pulling some “very bad things” out of me) We have not decided if a trip to see an oncologist is in order, and even if it is in order, i’m not sure i wanna go see the butchers, submit to the diagnostic torture, and fight with them about my alternative therapy choices… so is my remission at an end or not? does it really matter? the answer is the same… I live in a house that makes the cure…. So I will be doing high dose phoenix tears therapy until all these masses are gone… By the way, I have DVD copies of Run From The Cure available for anyone who needs them… I intend to hand them out free at hospitals and Run for the Cure events……
I fulfilled that mission. I have given out at least 50 free copies of the “Run from the Cure” that I had paid a company to make for me. I still have around 50 to go. Some went to dispensaries (as you would expect), some were handed out in the doctor’s office(s) I visited, others went to health food stores, some went to herbalists and naturopathic healers, some went to people I happened to speak to in the grocery store line, more went in random places where it was up to fate to decide whose hands the video ended up in… like outside of tobacco shops, liquor stores, and gambling dens.
I had to shave the back of my head to make topical application of the cannabis oil thinned slightly with olive oil an easier thing to do. I remembered a haircut that had been popular in my youth, and secure in the knowledge that my treatment would not make my hair fall out, I only shaved the back of my head. If I wore a scarf, no one could tell that the back of my head was so lumpy, uneven and working on using the cancer cure. But it wasn’t just a mass on the back of my head, I also had a mass in my left breast and small masses in various other parts of my body (along the lymphatic system’s pathways). My digestive tract was so messed up that I have lived on a liquid diet almost exclusively from March 2012-the present (although I have recently been able to eat/digest more solid food). There were a ton of other symptoms as well. It was agony. By taking the phoenix tears in very high doses, I was able to eliminate all the masses the doctors had found. They were shocked, amazed, and educated by my “miraculous healing”. They had given me about a month to live, and within that month, I made all the cancer go away using cannabis oil.
On September 24, 2012 at 10:46pm my Facebook status proudly read:
Doc says I am cancer free…. Doc said the remaining portion of the mass on the back of my head is acute muscle tension (thank you fibro). Doc says my doggie gave me a minor head injury while playing with me… doc also says I have Acute Pancreatitis and need to be on bed-rest and clear liquids for a while….. I was afraid of people showing up at the er, so I had to say it was a bud of mine and not me…. They wanted to keep me at the hospital for a few days to control the pain and ensure I was ok, but I just couldn’t handle that and I know I can get a shit-ton of things done on bedrest at home where as I couldn’t get jack and shit done at the hospital…. Thanks for the love and support guys…. I needed it and still do….
The good news is I can eat solid foods again (sometimes) and I am getting a lot more sleep than I have been capable of in years with the addition of the new treatment based on the diagnosis of Familial Mediterranean Fever.
_______________________________
Even harry pot-head (i mean potter) knows Phoenix Tears have healing powers!!!
_______________________________
Still Curious about the Cure for Cancer? Read ON!
_______________________________
Is there a difference between Hemp and Cannabis?
Yes and no… Hemp generally refers to either the male plant or the portions of the plant used for their fiber. Cannabis generally refers to the female plant and the portions of the plant used for it’s psychoactive and healing effects.
: any of the preparations (as marijuana or hashish) or chemicals (as THC) that are derived from the hemp
and are psychoactive
Origin of CANNABIS
Latin, hemp, from Greek kannabis; akin to Old English hænephemp
First Known Use: 1783
Author’s note ~ there is so much more to know on the origin of the word Cannabis!!!
If you do your homework on cannabis well,
you should have come across kaneh-bosim (Hebrew קְנֵה-בֹשֶׂם)
The anthropologist Sula Benet did a lot of work
on the etymology of this word and it’s association
with Old Testament biblical recipe for Holy Anointing Oil given in Exodus 30:22-25.
Benet’s writings have gained modern notability[citation needed]
for her interpretations of the herb appearing in
Hebrew text as kaneh-bosim (Hebrew קְנֵה-בֹשֶׂם)
five times in the Hebrew Bible and how it
relates to the religious use of cannabis.
Kaneh-bosm is mentioned twice as part of
the holy anointing oil used in the temple,
and has been interpreted traditionally as calamus
(an herb that is known in North American shamanism
and in vedic atharva and has been discovered in
modern times to contain a molecule known as Asarone
that is a precursor of trimethoxyamphetamine, a psychedelic).
Through comparative etymology, analysis of ancient texts
(including pre-Hebrew Semitic language), a
nd pharmacological consistencies she contends that
the word kaneh-bosm actually refers to cannabis
and was used in ancient Jewish religious rites,
as a medicine and ritual sacrament.
Benet’s work claims that cannabis use has a long culturally important history,
and that the criminalization and demonization of cannabis is a recent invention
(an occurrence of the previous century compared to Torah: dating back at least 3,000 years).
While Benet’s conclusion regarding the psychoactive use of cannabis
are not generally recognized among Jewish scholars,
there is general agreement that hemp (“Kaneh”)
is used in talmudic sources to refer to hemp fibers,
as hemp was a vital commodity before linen replaced it.[1]
Benet claims that traditional identifications of kaneh bosom
do not account for hemp shirts being produced from industrial hemp,
which Benet claims is “Kaneh” in Hebrew.[2]
Benet claims that this kaneh differs from the “fragrant” or “sweet” hemp
called especially kaneh bosm, because the latter
produces much more of aromatic and psychotropic substances like CBD and THC.[2] [3]
reference url: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sula_Benet
I am grateful to live in a country that has freedom of religion. I personally believe that cannabis was out on our planet by a loving creator to enrich our lives and keep us healthy.
Is Hemp SEED oil the same as the cannabis cure oil?
NO! they are produced in entirely different methods from different parts and even different sexes of the plant!!! While I do recommend people cook with hemp seed oil whenever possible, It is not the cure for cancer. It is “health food” because its 3:1 ratio of omega-6 to omega-3essential fatty acids, which matches the balance required by the human body.
Hemp oil or hempseed oil is obtained by pressing hemp seeds. Cold pressed, unrefined hemp oil is dark to clear light green in color, with a pleasant nutty flavour. The darker the color, the grassier the flavour.
Refined hempseed oil is clear and colorless, with little flavor and lacks natural vitamins and antioxidants. Refined hempseed oil is primarily used in body care products. Industrial hempseed oil is used in lubricants, paints, inks, fuel, and plastics. Hempseed oil has found some limited use in the production of soaps, shampoos and detergents. The oil is of high nutritional value because its 3:1 ratio of omega-6 to omega-3essential fatty acids, which matches the balance required by the human body.[1] It has also received attention in recent years as a possible feedstock for the large-scale production of biodiesel.[2][3] There are a number of organisations that promote the production and use of hempseed oil.[4]
Hemp seed oil (right)
Hempseed oil is manufactured from varieties of Cannabis sativa that do not contain significant amounts of THC, the psychoactive element present in the cannabis plant. This manufacturing process typically includes cleaning the seed to 99.99% before pressing the oil. There is no THC within the hempseed, although trace amounts of THC may be found in hempseed oil when plant matter adheres to the seed surface during manufacturing. The modern production of hempseed oil, particularly in Canada, has successfully lowered THC values since 1998.[5]Hash oil, not to be confused with hempseed oil, is used for both medicinal and recreational purposes and made from the mature female flowers and leaves of the drug cannabis, thus having a much higher THC content. Hash oil should not be confused with hemp, as the modern usage of the word ‘hemp’ is reserved for plants that meet the legal requirement of containing 0.3% THC or less.[citation needed]Nutrition
The proportions of linoleic acid and alpha-linolenic acid in one tablespoon per day (15 ml) of hempseed oil easily provides human daily requirements for EFAs. Unlike flaxseed oil, hempseed oil can be used continuously without developing a deficiency or other imbalance of EFAs. This has been demonstrated in a clinical study, where the daily ingestion of flaxseed oil decreased the endogenous production of GLA.[6]In common with other oils, hempseed oil provides 9 kcal/g. Compared with other culinary oils it is low in saturated fatty acids.[7]Highly unsaturated oils, and especially poor quality oils, can spontaneously oxidize and turn rancid within a short period of time when they are not stored properly; i.e., in a cool/cold, dark place, preferably in a dark glass bottle. Hempseed oil can be frozen for longer periods of storage time. Preservatives (antioxidants) are not necessary for high-quality oils that are stored properly.
Hempseed oil has a relatively low smoke point and is not suitable for frying. Hempseed oil is primarily used as a food oil and dietary supplement, and has been shown to relieve the symptoms of eczema (atopic dermatitis).[8]Benefits
Hemp is a high protein seed containing all nine of the essential amino acids (like flax). It also has high amounts of fatty acids and fiber as well as containing vitamin E and trace minerals. It has a balanced ratio of omega 3 to 6 fats at around a three to one ratio. This won’t help correct your omega balance if it’s off, but it gives you the right balance to start with.
Further the protein content of the hemp seed is supposed to be very digestible. Many people noted their personal experience of finding that hemp seed protein did not cause bloating or gas, like some of their whey, or other protein shakes did.
And, get this, unlike soy which has super high amounts of phytic acid (that anti-nutrient that prevents us from absorbing minerals), hemp seed doesn’t contain phytic acid. At the very least, this makes hemp seed a step up from soy.
The Body Ecology Diet site has an article discussing hemp here.
It contains a list of benefits including what I mentioned above plus including some others as well.
Hemp contains:
* All 20 amino acids, including the 9 essential amino acids (EAAs) our bodies cannot produce.
* A high protein percentage of the simple proteins that strengthen immunity and fend off toxins.
* Eating hemp seeds in any form could aid, if not heal, people suffering from immune deficiency diseases. This conclusion is supported by the fact that hemp seed has been used to treat nutritional deficiencies brought on by tuberculosis, a severe nutrition blocking disease that causes the body to waste away.3
* Nature’s highest botanical source of essential fatty acid, with more essential fatty acid than flax or any other nut or seed oil.
* A perfect 3:1 ratio of Omega-6 Linoleic Acid and Omega-3 Linolenic Acid – for cardiovascular health and general strengthening of the immune system.
* A superior vegetarian source of protein considered easily digestible.
* A rich source of phytonutrients, the disease-protective element of plants with benefits protecting your immunity, bloodstream, tissues, cells, skin, organs and mitochondria.
* The richest known source of polyunsaturated essential fatty acids.
This article claims that because hemp’s protein is in the globulin edistin form it is a superior source of protein. It ends that thought with this paragraph.
“The best way to insure the body has enough amino acid material to make the globulins is to eat foods high in globulin proteins. Since hemp seed protein is 65% globulin edistin, and also includes quantities of albumin, its protein is readily available in a form quite similar to that found in blood plasma. Eating hemp seeds gives the body all the essential amino acids required to maintain health, and provides the necessary kinds and amounts of amino acids the body needs to make human serum albumin and serum globulins like the immune enhancing gamma globulins. Eating hemp seeds could aid, if not heal, people suffering from immune deficiency diseases. This conclusion is supported by the fact that hemp seed was used to treat nutritional deficiencies brought on by tuberculosis, a severe nutrition blocking disease that causes the body to waste away. [Czechoslovakia Tubercular Nutritional Study, 1955] “
Hemp oil is a “drying oil”, as it can polymerize into a solid form. Due to its polymer-forming properties, hemp oil is used on its own or blended with other oils, resins, and solvents as an impregnator and varnish in wood finishing, as a pigment binder in oil paints, as a plasticizer and hardener in putty. It has uses similar to Linseed oil and characteristics similar totung oil.[9]click here for reference information for the above hemp seed oil portion of the post
_______________________________
Foods to avoid to heal Cancer more effectively:
Red meat and refined sugars are a bad idea. If you need more protein, I suggest eating raw shelled hemp seeds. Any vegetarian having trouble getting enough protein in their diet should buy some. A serving of 3 tablespoons packs 10 grams of protein! If you have a sweet tooth, try to stay away from the white sugar and any sugars that have been through a lengthy refining process. Natural sugars such as honey or molasses and naturally occurring sugars in fruit are a good option.
Red Meat
A March 2012 study from Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) researchers has found that red meat consumption is associated with an increased risk of total, cardiovascular, and cancer mortality. The results also showed that substituting other healthy protein sources, such as fish, poultry, nuts, and legumes, was associated with a lower risk of mortality.
n 1931, German biologist Otto Heinrich Warburg won a Nobel Prize for his research into the causes of cancer. In his studies, Warburg found that cancerous tumors fueled their growth through the metabolism of glucose — digested sugar. Although some scientists rejected Warburg’s theories for many decades, recent studies have drawn connections between different types of cancer and refined sugar intake.
Insulin Resistance and Cancer
The pancreas works with your digestive system to produce the hormone insulin, which aids in the metabolism of glucose. When you eat carbohydrates, the pancreas automatically releases insulin to help break the carbs down into glucose to fuel your cells. If you are insulin-resistant and eating a diet of primarily high-glycemic foods, your pancreas becomes overworked and cannot keep up with the demand for insulin, allowing glucose to build up in your bloodstream. Insulin resistance increases your risk of several diseases, including Type 2 diabetes, heart disease and some cancers. To prevent cancer, the World Cancer Research Fund and the American Institute for Cancer Research recommended against consuming sugary beverages and snacks in a 2007 report.
Research into Specific Cancers
Many later studies have shown a direct connection between insulin resistance, high-glycemic diets and certain types of cancer. In a study of more than 2,500 women published in the “Annals of Oncology” in 2001, the findings supported a connection between insulin resistance and breast cancer development. Another study published in the “American Journal of Epidemiology” in 2006 followed 16,000 Norwegian men for 27 years and found insulin resistance to be a predictor of prostate cancer. An analysis of a study conducted in Italy from 1986 to 1992 published in the “Annals of Oncology” in 2008 drew a link between high-glycemic diets and thyroid cancer risk.
Beginning dosing of this medication is truly tiny for most individuals. The patient should eat their doses, not smoke them. I have had people who have smoked their tears out of desperation due to a lack of cannabis flowers, but it does not do you nearly as much good to smoke it. If you are in severe pain, the lungs can be the fastest way for the medication to begin to ease it, but this method does not offer the deeper levels of healing that eating it can give you.
Tears made properly have been through a process known as decarboxylation that makes the compounds within the cannabis plant more easily used by the body’s endocannabinoid system when ingested. Be careful not to overheat your medication either. You lose your active compounds if you cook with too much heat. Never store your cannabis oil in the sunshine, though it does not need to be refrigerated (it actually becomes too thick to get out of the oral syringe if it is too cold…) if your meds won’t flow from the syringe, try putting upright in a cup of warm water for 10-15 minutes. Be sure the syringe opening is pointing towards the ceiling You don’t want the hassle of trying to reclaim your tears from the cup of water)
Beginners should ingest 1/2-1 grain of rice sized dab of oil 2-3 times a day. Doses must be increased with the patient’s tolerance.
_______________________________
How many grams to a milliliter of phoenix tears oil?
I do NOT recommend people be on the oil and chemotherapy/radiation at the same time they are on the oil. When people do that, the oil spends all its time repairing the damage that the chemo/radiation caused within their body and does not seem to fight the cancer as effectively (takes more oil and a longer duration of therapy if they are determined to keep up with the “big pharma” solutions.) I have seen people who made the choice to stay on chemo and they still got better on the oil… It is all a matter of free will in the end.
I guess the point of that is: Don’t make the oil’s job any harder than it already is by introducing more poison into the system.
_______________________________
Side Effects of the oil?
Some patients find it a bad idea to take the oil on an empty stomach (usually people who have issues with SEVERE nausea anyway). Those patients should take their doses with a meal. Some patients find the taste undesirable For those patients, I recommend either putting the oil in a vegetable capsule (almost any vitamin shop or health food store carries empty ones) or they could put the dose on a piece of bread and swallow it like a pill.
Most patients start with a dab of oil that is about the size of a grain of rice (and for some people, even that is too potent because they dislike the psychoactive effects… those individuals begin on 1/2 of a grain of rice sized dose)
This dose should be taken 2-3 times a day until the patient begins to notice a drop off in the psychoactive effects and/or a drop off in the ways the oil had been helping.
For many patients, they notice a drop off in the appetite stimulation at this point. When the patient reaches this treatment plateau, you begin increasing the dose amount (within the patient’s tolerance for the oil/psychoactive effects)
The goal is to reach a total weight of one gram per day. The syringes I fill are clearly marked with 1ml graduations. 1ml=1.2 grams of oil.
Some patients have experienced visual hallucinations on this medication. This can be quite unnerving the first time it happens, however most of the patients I have dealt with describe very pleasant “trips” such as sitting on a cloud and speaking with their creator or having the feeling of balls of light invading the body and healing them. Hallucinations tend to happen more often in older patients and in patients who have no prior experience with cannabis (never even smoked a joint). If the patient finds the hallucinations uncomfortable or wants to avoid the experience, reduce dosing until a tolerance is built.
Some patients find they will run a fever off and on during the therapy. Often it is localized to the area where the cancer is (warm to the to the touch) I am a firm believer in letting a fever run it’s course unless it gets to a level where it is dangerously high {about 104 for adults or sustained 102 (constant not up and down) for a few days….} and even then there are plenty of non-big pharma ways to lower the temp…. several herbs do the trick well…. there are even plenty of non-chemical ways to lower a dangerous fever. Most people reach for the tylenol if they are even a degree above what they think they should be… they are damaging their liver and not even giving their immune system the benefit of the purpose of a fever… to help your immune system get rid of whatever invader it is responding to. click here for wikipedia article on fevers
This medication is psychoactive and there is really no way around “feeling high” while you are on it. People who hate the psychoactive effects should take their largest dose of medication primarily at night when they want to sleep anyway. Caregivers should be aware of a fall hazard to the patient. Some people it makes a bit unsteady on their feet, especially when getting up for the bathroom at night. For males with this issue, I recommend a bedside urinal to reduce the danger of a fall. Same solution works for ladies (a bedpan) but fewer women are willing to use a bedpan than men are willing to use a urinal.
If you are ingesting cannabis oil that has been made properly at all, You WILL test positive for cannabis use on any drug test. Most regular cannabis smokers know that you will test positive for weed for about 30 days after smoking it. It is important to note that the 30 days rule of thumb DOES NOT APPLY TO CANNABIS OIL. Those who have ingested cannabis oil (particularly at high doses) could test positive for cannabis in a drug test up to 90 days after the treatment has stopped.
What Solvent to use?
What solvent you use to create your cannabis oil is very important. If you are thinking of making your own oil, please take the time to educate yourself on the benefits and risks of any solvent you are thinking of using.
I recommend use of food grade alcohol and nothing else for beginners (because the solvent is already food grade, it is good for beginners who are learning the method… that way, IF any solvent is left behind due to inexperience, it is still safe to consume. Those proficient with use of alcohol as a solvent may then begin using isopropyl alcohol 91% (rubbing alcohol) once they have learned to tell when no solvent remains. If you use a still, you can reclaim your solvent for reuse to cut down on costs.
There have been cases of people eating cold water extracted hash or kief and seeing benefits as well. You just have to eat a higher volume of those substances because they are in a less concentrated form.
Someone actually said to me….. ” Butane is so safe,it is used in food with no label”
Is that why I (and many others) cannot tolerate butane extracted hash? is that why it makes my body ache every time I smoke it? again… I will follow my common sense and you follow yours….
“Despite its usefulness, butane is also a toxic chemical. Inhalation of the gas can lead to drowsiness, narcosis, cardiac arrhythmia, frostbite, and death from asphyxiation, acute toxicity, and ventricular fibrillation. Butane inhalation is the most common single cause of solvent-related death. Thus, butane needs to be handled with care.” http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Butane
Please also be sure to read the commentary on both versions of this video. I kindly call it a debate, but anyone who reads it will see that I have taken a great deal of heat for educating people to the dangers of using the petrochemical naphtha to create cannabis oil.
This oil will stain fabric and just about anything you get it on. It can be very difficult to clean up when spilled. ISO alcohol is the best method I have found to clean up spills and messes. It does not always take stains out of fabric (time is of the essence in treating those stains), but it is excellent for cleaning up spills just about everywhere else. Syringes I provide have a toothpick in the opening of the syringe that MUST be removed prior to pressing on the plunger to get your dose. Keep that toothpick in the syringe when not actually taking a dose to reduce medication loss. You should also release some of the pressure on the plunger (by pulling it back out some post dose time) every time you use it for the same reason. Putting oil in capsules, and the capsules in a pill bottle is the most effective way I have found to dose “on the go” (while the patient is away from home, i.e. out running errands).
_______________________________
Ronnie Smith taught me how to make the oil. Mr. Smith has been making the Cannabis oil for 6 years and has seen over 250 of his patients be cured by this amazing plant gifted to the animal kingdom by the loving creator responsible for us all. Mr. Smith of marijuanaman.com provides the following information sheet to his patients.
__________
Hemp Oil Dosage Information
__________
It takes the average person about 90 days to ingest the full 60 gram treatment. I suggest that people start with 3 doses per day about half the size of a grain of dry rice. A dose such as this would equal about ¼ of a drop. After four days at this dosage, increase your doses every four days until you are at the point where you are ingesting about 1 gram in 24 hours, so each dose should equal 1/3 of a gram.
It takes the average person about 5 weeks to get to the point where they can ingest a gram per day. Once they reach this dosage they can continue at this rate until the cancer disappears. A gram is 1.2 milliliters.
By using this method it allows the body to build up its tolerance slowly, in fact, I have many reports from people who took the oil treatment and never got ‘high’. We all have different tolerances for any medication. Your size and body weight have little to do with your tolerance for hemp oil.
Be aware when commencing treatment with hemp oil that it will lower your blood pressure, so if you are currently taking blood pressure medication, it is very likely that you will no longer need it.
When people are taking the oil, I like to see them stay within their comfort zone, but the truth is, the faster you take the oil the better the chance of surviving. At the end of their treatment most people continue taking the oil but at a much reduced rate. 6 to 12 grams a year would be a good maintenance dose. I do not like to see people overdosing on the oil, but an overdose does no harm. The main side effect of this medication is sleep and rest which plays an important role in the healing process. Usually, within an hour or so of taking a dose, the oil is telling you to lay down and relax. Don’t fight the sleepy feeling, just lay down and go with it. Usually within a month, the daytime tiredness associated with this treatment fades away but the patient continues to sleep very well at night. The only time I would recommend that people start out with larger doses would be to get off addictive and dangerous pain medications. When people who are using such medications begin the oil treatment, they usually cut their pain medications in half. The object is to take enough oil to take care of the pain and to help the patient get off these dangerous pharmaceutical drugs. Taking the oil makes it much easier for the patient to get off these addictive chemicals.
I simply tell people the oil will do one of two things; it will either cure your cancer or in cases where it is too late to affect a cure, the oil will ease their way out and they can at least die with dignity. Hemp oil has a very high success rate in the treatment of cancer; unfortunately many people who come to me have been badly damaged by the medical system with their chemo and radiation etc. The damage such treatments cause have a lasting effect and people who have suffered the effects of such treatments are the hardest to cure. It should also be mentioned that the oil rejuvenates vital organs like the pancreas. Many diabetics who have taken the oil find that after about six weeks on the oil that they no longer require insulin since their pancreas is again doing its job. Properly made hemp medicine is the greatest healer on this planet bar none. Once you experience what this medication can do you will understand why history and I call hemp medicine a cure all.
_______________________________
A bit of Cancer poetry for thought…
To Whom It May Concern I was run over by the truth one day. Ever since the diagnosis I have been this way So burn my body with radiation Tell me lies about cancer.
Heard the alarm clock screaming with pain, Couldn’t find myself so I went back to sleep again So fill my veins with Chemo burn my body with radiation Tell me lies about cancer. Every time I shut my eyes, all I see is pain. Made a little ribbon to remember all the names So empty out my bank account fill my veins with chemo burn my body with radiation Tell me lies about cancer.I hear they are thinking surgery, hope it’s not my brains. They’re only cuttin wishes and feeding casket sales So numb my brain with Morphine empty out my bank account fill my veins with chemo burn my body with radiation Tell me lies about cancer.Where were you at the time of the crime? Ripping up the hippocratic oath, just to make a dime? So chain my Life with hopelessness numb my brain with Morphine empty out my bank account fill my veins with chemo burn my body with radiation Tell me lies about cancer
You put your doctors in, they take their conscience out, They take the human being and they twist it all about So take my world away chain my Life with hopelessness numb my brain with Morphine empty out my bank account fill my veins with chemo burn my body with radiation Tell me lies about cancer–
how many beautiful women and men need to be butchered
because doctors want to run from the cure
for the sake of monetary gain?
_______________________________
_______________________________
Thinking of beginning on this therapy for yourself or a loved one? Please be sure that the patient and the patient’s caregiver have seen the “Run from the Cure” movie and are willing to ingest cannabis.
If you are looking for a safe medication, look no further than what the hemp plant can provide. On top of all that it’s a medicine we can all grow and produce ourselves. Also there is no need for a doctor’s supervision with its use.
When the hemp plant is grown for medicinal use, you now have your own medical system that is much safer and effective than anything our current medical system provides. You still may require a doctor to set your broken leg, but you will no longer need the chemicals they have been pushing upon us.
Hemp is medicine for the masses and no one has the right to control its use. We are all different and we all have different tolerances for practically everything. So it is up to each and every one of us to determine for ourselves how much oil we require to maintain good health.
Over the years people have come to me who after years of treatment by the medical system did not even have a diagnosis for their conditions. But the oil exercised its amazing healing power and their medical problems were solved.
Another aspect of the use of hemp as medicine is its anti-aging properties. As we age, our vital organs deteriorate and of course this impairs the function of these organs.
Hemp oil rejuvenates vital organs even in small doses it is very common for people to report to me that they feel 20 to 30 years younger after only ingesting the oil for a short time.
Now let’s take it to the next level. What about people who ingest larger quantities of oil over a longer period of time like myself? After 9 years on the oil my body does not appear to be that of a 60 year old man. Instead, my body has the appearance of someone who is a great deal younger. When I have the oil at my disposal I like to take about a quarter of a gram a day. Of course, due to short supply, quite often I must go without so my own treatment has been erratic to say the least.
From my own experience with the oil I cannot help but wonder what would happen if a person was to ingest larger quantities of oil over a longer period of time. If a person were to do this, can they actually reverse the aging process and grow younger instead of aging.
From the oils effect on my own body by all appearances this seems to be the case. Someday soon when I have enough oil I intend to start taking a gram a day for a year to see what effect it has on my body.
Many people who have taken the oil have stated that they thought it to be the fountain of youth. From my own experiences with the oil I believe this to be true.
I make oil/give away oil and even sell oil, however, I DO encourage everyone to learn how to make their own medicine. That being said, I understand that not everyone has the desire or strength to make the oil for themselves.
is a group on Facebook. It is full of knowledgeable individuals who have seen the healing that can come from this therapy. Often, people have to hide the fact they are on this treatment for fear of persecution/prosecution. Cannabis Oil Success Stories gives people on the therapy a forum to share information and to help each other get through any bumps along the road during therapy. They lend support to both patients and caregivers who are embarking on this Cannabis Healing Journey.
_______________________________
This medication is very effective when used topically Please take a look at these stories!
I must admit that I have not updated you all on this story in FAR too long. I must also admit that all I was truly able to do for this ulcer is to prevent it from becoming overly dangerous to a very resistive patient. I could have achieved more success had I been able to convince Fat Freddy (the patient) to stop wearing his suspenders. I believe that the wound began as a pressure sore from those suspenders, and as long as he continues to wear them, he will continue to have a sore there. During my prolonged illness this summer, I had someone else take over his wound care. Initially, they did not follow instructions or treat his wound and within a few weeks, his shoulder looked like the “before” images in the below video. When therapy resumed, his wound resumed the healing process and was back to the level of healing it had been when I last provided documentation. I have a few videos and images that have been piling up on this story, however due to the patient’s stubbornness, I have little faith that this wound will ever truly heal. What can be done is continuing the therapy and preventing a major infection in a geriatric body.
This is a patient under Mr. Ronnie Smith’s care. Mr. Smith runs marijuanaman.com. The video was created by the patient and the audio track was added by Ms. Breezy.
Cannabis cured David Triplett’s skin cancer. The above video is his story.
It has been proven that concentrated cannabis extract oil cures cancer.
Why hasn’t The U.S. National Cancer Institute or The American Cancer Society tested Cannabis Oil?. Is it lack of personnel (2,100 USNCI staff members) or limited financial support (USNCI 2010 budget of $5.1 Billion dollars!)
Cannabis Concentrate or extract is the same as Rick Simpson’s “Hemp Oil”. Hemp seed oil is NOT what Rick Simpson is making and using.
Google “cannabinoids” and “cancer”.
Google “endocannabinoids” and “cancer”
Google “THC” and “Cancer”.
Google pubmed, go there and look up “endocannabinoids” and “cancer”, as well as “cannabinoids” and “cancer”.
*****Note, in the interest of full disclosure, David Triplett is not my personal patient. His story is so powerful that I felt the need to include it here with this information.
This is a patient under Mr. Ronnie Smith’s care. Mr. Smith runs marijuanaman.com
A Note from Breezy on Seizures If you have seizures, strain choice can make a big difference. For some patients with seizures, a concentrated form of cannabis is not even necessary when the right strain choices of flowers for smoking are available. Generally, any strain from the white widow branch of the cannabis family tree is a good choice. Please view the Cannabis products and Colorado Dispensary Reviews Page here on kiefair.com for more information on strain choice for epilepsy and several other conditions. Check the description of the videos for more information.
“I hope you are in the mood to be showered with praise. I want you to hear what YOUR medicine is doing. Mom outlived her prognosis. She is feeling as healthy as a horse. Labs are great. Tumors have shrunk even more. There is NO new metastasis. Doctor doesn’t know what to think. This is shaking him up a bit. He says her chemo would not do this and even if it did, there is no way she could be this healthy. Breezy you are a true gift from God!”
~anonymous daughter of a cancer patient
This is a patient under Ms. Breezy Kiefair’s care. Ms. Breezy runs kiefair.com
back injury patient…. the injury has long since healed as far as it wants to, but the pain has stuck around for them making work/day to day life difficult. She had this to say regarding their night spent sleeping with a gram of phoenix tears oil in a capsule…..
“I slept like a rock last night only after spinning like crazy. Think that was a little too much even for me! Had the worst case of cotton mouth ever and I think I am still feeling the effects. just got home from cleaning my aunts bathrooms woo that was an easy $50”
~anonymous back pain patient
This is a patient under Ms. Breezy Kiefair’s care. Ms. Breezy runs kiefair.com
_______________________________
On Use of Phoenix Tears to Treat
Severe Pain or Chronic Intractable Pain
_______________________________
Higher dosing may be necessary for those with severe pain. Dosing for Intractable pain can match that of a cancer patient (a gram a day), and in some cases even exceed it. Remember folks… your nervous system can only send so many pain signals to the brain before the brain senses an attack/danger of some kind. Your brain may not understand in the least what the threat is or where it is coming from… enough pain=physiological responses to a threat in the brain. Once the threat is sensed, it turns on our most primitive parts of the brain out of sheer survival mode…. when someone is bathed in adrenalyne because of their pain, they are not really themselves any more… there is a primitive auto-pilot in the captains chair that doesn’t give a damn about logic or reason or anything other than mitigating the threat it thinks is there because of all the pain signals. Real Niacin (not niacinamide) can help circumvent this cycle, but only if you can tolerate the flushing (remember itching powder you could put in someone’s drink? remember how it said it was harmless? that is because it was niacin)
This also explains why people can be exhausted, weak and seemingly unable to even rise out of bed one moment, and then when that adrenaline kicks in… why, you’re a screaming banshee with all the energy you could possibly need to destroy yourself and those you love around you? I try to channel it into things like getting caught up on cleaning, or directing the anger/passion somewhere (anywhere) it is more deserved than on my loved ones….. if that means crafting a letter to the government telling them what’s up or if that means telling someone that really needs to hear it in a powerful way what the causes their actions are having… I try to direct all that adrenaline into more positive places when it happens, but it is such a negative feeling that it is really easy to loose track of the fact that there is no real threat other than the ones coming from your own central nervous system…
In some cases, all that can be done is to ease the passing of a dear friend with the only mercy you can find. Sometimes the cure just gets there too late to do much more than ease the pain of passing away. Sometimes people are just too stubborn and wait too long to begin treatment. Other times, the knowledge of this treatment remains elusive to the patient or their loved one’s attention until there just isn’t enough time left for the oil to work. We had a pet owner recently who valiantly tried to save his best friend’s life (his dog). Duke the Cancer fighting dog may not have had the “happy ending” we were all hoping for, but it did make the end of life less painful for this dog. We also got word that after the pooch no longer could use the medicine, his human companion was able to use the oil and see the benefits in his own body. Sometimes it’s a mixed blessing like that. This is a joint patient under Mr. Ronnie Smith and Ms. Breezy Kiefair’s care. Mr. Smith runs marijuanaman.com and Ms. Breezy Kiefair runs kiefair.com
_______________________________
Gramps’ Cannabis Oil & Cancer Journey
*****Note, in the interest of full disclosure, “Gramps” is not my personal patient. His story is so powerful that I felt the need to include it here with this information.
from the healing files of Auntie Debi Phillips “I am so sorry I haven’t got back to you. First the hand: fantastic. Almost totally healed, after the first treatment with the oil all inflammation was gone infection was almost cleared up, I aired it all day then just washed it & re-bandaged it . I had had an allergic reaction to the lasik they used & had a bad red burn around I that hurt. The next morning it was gone, burn healed. The scar tissue that had formed before oil had been so tight I could hardly move my thumb, after the oil it became elastic again & I’ve been able to move my thumb again without pain. Yesterday the skin graft they put on it fell off & the wound looks fantastic. Going to treat with oil again & a sore the Dr. Wants to remove when I go next time on my elbow. I don’t want to have it cut on like this one so if I treat it now I’m praying when he scraps it again this time there won’t be any cancer cells this time & when he wonders why I am handing him educational material, maybe he will convert or at least be receptive.
I am so grateful for saving my hand. I really believe if you hadn’t sent the oil I wouldn’t be able to use my thumb & first finger. I’ve also been working as secretary where my life partner works as a mechanic. I have two more spots of skin cancer. I”m gonna take pictures of before & during treatment & the end results also.” (Debi is breezy’s adopted auntie)
_______________________________
What is the bottom line if you desire to make the oil yourself or are unable to make it?
_______________________________
It takes one pound of cannabis to create 2 ounces of oil. For those who are financially secure, the price for the cure is $2,000. The smallest amount I can sell is one oral syringe of oil for $500. 1 oral syringe = 12 grams of treatment. 12 grams is about 1 month’s worth of medicine for the beginner. It takes 5 syringes (2 ounces) to cure most cases of cancer.
_______________________________
Free Phoenix Tears???
I have a free phoenix tears patient to patient program for those who are low income or out of the treatment temporarily.
_______________________________
Unfortunately, demand for the free oil is so high that (as I type 10/29/12) I am looking at a month before that line even moves, I do triage people based on severity of illness and financial need for the free list. Please remember that I provide these mercies out of my own pocket. Donations of raw materials or monetary support are few and far between. When they happen, I am grateful. When support is absent, I still try and find a way to serve those in need regardless of ability to pay.
Some people get angry at me during the wait-list period not realizing that I am trying to help as many people as possible with as little as possible… even going unmedicated myself at times to do it… I really hate dry times like these… I try and remind myself and others getting low on patience that I do this out of my own pocket… no one (on any sort of regular basis) donates raw materials to me to get these mercies done.
No matter how much i wish to heal sick people, there have been some I had to harden my heart to because they became abusive… Now, I can understand better than most how pain can turn you into a monster…
If people are able to act like adults later and make amends, my heart softens… if not, then i just have to close the door to contact and feel guilty… (i have taken more than my fair share of abuse in this life already.. verbal and otherwise… and I cannot continue to do this work if I do not set firm boundaries with individuals like this)
To those of you mature enough to stick around for the long haul, I’m saying how much I appreciate working with people like you who see the larger picture. looking like a month or so before the list begins to move again… and cancer waits for no man woman or child. For these cold realities, I apologize.
Free Program and ALL OIL REFERRALS through this site closed as of March 2013 through Kiefair.com due to change in author’s circumstances! I will update if I begin to offer them again. I do still offer informational consultations.
There is a cure for cancer and I am here to help you in your pursuit of life.
_______________________________
i’ve done a lot of time walking with the creator to get from where I was to where I am now…. that’s what faith can do… even if i am a ball of drama 99% of the time because of my past…..
I have been long winded (as always), and for that I apologize.
I’d like to speak to Colorado for a moment and it’s voters…. I feel I must leave you with the following thoughts regarding how you cast your vote on the Amendment 64 issue in a few days.
For the record, I STILL do NOT SUPPORT COLORADO CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT 64 Corporate Greed IS NOT LEGAL WEED! Vote NO on Colorado State Constitutional Amendment 64! (or at least read the damn bill and see how corporate minded it is and then make up your mind…. don’t listen to the pamphlets or the tv spots… trust your own reasoning after reading the LANGUAGE you are making yourself subject to!)….. Read the bill and think about who they wrote the bill to benefit… their own freaking pocketbooks, that’s who… read the text of the AMMENDMENT (provided in red letters at the link https://kiefair.com/2012/04/15/colorado-canna-relief-or-cannabis-like-alcohol-you-decide/ ) and then decide how to vote… don’t just think “YAY legal weed” and vote… you’re not getting what you think you are babies!
The bill that is written to serve those who already have money (dispensary owners wanting to convert to party stores to sell to recreational users and stop dealing with us “difficult” sick people). If you read the bills closely, it is really easy to see whom they were written to serve…. the Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol serves those already deep in the industry and keeps the grows in corporate hands…. I believe the recreational users should be allowed to grow. It’s just a plant….. When people see the shackles and chains
slapped on them by this bill in reality (the words put into practice) people are going to be just as pissed about these regulations as they are about the regs under hb-1284/sb-109
Effective January 1, 2012, the Registry will no longer accept Food Stamp and Supplemental Security Income letters as proof of low-income status.
Patients with a household income that is 185% of the Federal Poverty Level or less, qualify for fee waiver. The chart below indicates the annual household incomes, adjusted for family size, that qualify.
Household incomes at 185% of 2012 Federal Poverty Guidelines*
# in Family
Annual Income
1
$20,664.50
2
$27,990.50
3
$35,316.50
4
$42,642.50
5
$49,968.50
6
$57,294.50
7
$64,620.50
8
$71,946.50
Each Additional
$ 7,067.00
Source: Federal Register, Vol 75, No. 17, January 26, 2012, ppl 4034-4035
*Poverty guidelines are updated periodically in the Federal Register by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services under the authority of 42 U.S.C. 9902(2)
To apply for a Fee Waiver/Tax Exempt Status, patients must:
1. Request a certified copy of their most current State tax returnfrom the Department of Revenue. Tax returns must be within the last two years to qualify. Patients can request a certified copy of their tax return by completing form DR-5714 ‘Request for Copy of Tax Returns’ available atwww.colorado.gov/cms/forms/dor-tax/dr5714.pdf. The form must be completed, notarized and sent to the Colorado Department of Revenue for processing.
2. Complete form MMR1010 Request for Fee Waiver/Tax-Exempt Status.1010.pdf.
3. Send the Request for Fee Waiver/Tax-Exempt Status form and the certified copy of the most current State tax return with the patient’s application.
4. Patients who already have a Medical Marijuana Registration Card, may submit form MMR 1010 and a copy of their certified State tax return to have their card status modified to “Tax Exempt.”
You Can’t see my pain with your eyes. The only thing that relieves my pain is Cannabis! You could never imagine the pain I suffer, yet you deny me my freedom. Image by: The Art of Breezy Kiefair for the Reefer Gurl Facebook page
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
as always, thank you for your time and attention in reading this. If you found it useful or of value please share it with your friends. Did I miss something you think needs covered? Please comment in a respectful manner or message me so that the issue has been brought to my attention.
~ Do all that you can to cultivate peace within yourself, that it might
shine out from you, and plant the seed of peace in other spirits, for them
to cultivate.~{Remember… it is when we choose act on the issues that are in front of
our faces, when we choose to get involved instead of looking the other way
as our fellow man struggles, when we choose to take those small simple
little actions, working on righting little wrongs in our everyday lives that
really make change happen, those seemingly small actions are what really
make the world a better place and are a catalyst for greater social change.}
~Both quotes by Breedheen “Bree” O’Rilley Keefer~
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Always remember you can tell what a person really believes in by their actions… your actions prove to all the world who and what you bow down to in this life… Your actions tell people what your free will wants far louder and more plainly than your words ever could… When you are gone, those same seemingly small actions will give you exactly what you deserve.. to quote a long forgotten bit of poetry I read once on a faded newspaper clipping in a children’s reader from the 1860’s “how will men remember you when that you are gone… the little things you say and do, they shall linger on.”So I ask each of you to take a good look inside your own heads, hearts, spirits and souls and ask yourself… who do you serve? do you serve only yourself and ignore your fellow man? We all have areas we need improvement…. If you look in there and find your actions are not showing what is in your heart, then maybe it’s time to change your behavior to be more in line with the light shining within you however you choose to understand it….. that being said…. have a blessed day fully in line with your own free will and heart….
~Breedheen O’Rilley
I do not look like I have a single drop of Mediterranean blood in me, so why do i care about this rare genetic disorder? Because the color of skin is only skin deep. Because despite the pale appearance of my exterior, I have the genetic ancestor from that part of the world who handed me this recessive trait. Because I have this disease and have to live with it…
Breezy Kiefair struggling to gain weight post flare
I care because I need to repost the links as many times as possible in hopes that those related to me by blood will heed my warning and look for signs of the disorder in the kids…. I have made no secret of the fact that I am far estranged from my biological family, so I turn to electronic means to spread the word.
There is no cure, but the treatment does help….. There is no cure, but knowledge that there is indeed something wrong and that I am not a hypochondriac is soothing to the mind…. There is no cure, but it sure as hell does explain a lot about both myself and my blood relatives… BOTH my parents had to have the recessive gene in order for me to have this disorder. Both my parent’s sets of siblings may also be carriers of these recessive traits…. ALL of my blood siblings (half or full blooded) are POTENTIAL carriers of the defect…. Therefore, ALL of my blood nieces and nephews are potential victims of the disease as well as their children. It is my hope that those in my family will stumble upon this post and then value the family’s future generations enough to spread this information to where it may be of use (i emailed it directly to those whose email addresses I possess in my bloodline)
the below information was retrieved from: http://ghr.nlm.nih.gov/condition/familial-mediterranean-fever
What is familial Mediterranean fever?
Familial Mediterranean fever is an inherited condition characterized by recurrent episodes of painful inflammation in the abdomen, chest, or joints. These episodes are often accompanied by fever and sometimes a rash. The first episode usually occurs in childhood or the teenage years, but in some cases, the initial attack occurs much later in life. Typically, episodes last 12 to 72 hours and can vary in severity. The length of time between attacks is also variable. Without treatment to help prevent attacks and complications, a buildup of certain protein deposits (amyloidosis) in the body’s organs and tissues may occur, which can lead to kidney failure.
How common is familial Mediterranean fever?
Familial Mediterranean fever primarily affects populations originating in the Mediterranean region, particularly people of Armenian, Arabic, Turkish, and Jewish ancestry. The disorder affects from 1 in 250 people to 1 in 1,000 people in these populations. It is less common in other populations.
What genes are related to familial Mediterranean fever?
Mutations in the MEFV gene cause familial Mediterranean fever. The MEFV gene provides instructions for making a protein called pyrin (also known as marenostrin), which is found in white blood cells. This protein is involved in the immune system, helping to regulate the process of inflammation. Inflammation occurs when the immune system sends signaling molecules and white blood cells to a site of injury or disease to fight microbial invaders and facilitate tissue repair. When this has been accomplished, the body stops the inflammatory response to prevent damage to its own cells and tissues.
Mutations in the MEFV gene reduce the activity of the pyrin protein, which disrupts control of the inflammation process. An inappropriate or prolonged inflammatory response can result, usually accompanied by fever and pain in the abdomen, chest, or joints.
Normal variations in the SAA1 gene may modify the course of familial Mediterranean fever. Some evidence suggests that a particular version of the SAA1 gene (called the alpha variant) may increase the risk of amyloidosis among people with familial Mediterranean fever.
How do people inherit familial Mediterranean fever?
Familial Mediterranean fever is almost always inherited in an autosomal recessive pattern, which means both copies of the gene in each cell have mutations. The parents of an individual with an autosomal recessive condition each carry one copy of the mutated gene, but they typically do not show signs and symptoms of the condition.
In rare cases, this condition appears to be inherited in an autosomal dominant pattern, in which one copy of the altered gene in each cell is sufficient to cause the disorder and affected individuals often inherit the mutation from one affected parent. However, there are other possible explanations of this apparent pattern. A gene mutation that occurs frequently in a population may result in a disorder with autosomal recessive inheritance appearing in multiple generations in a family, a pattern that mimics autosomal dominant inheritance. If one parent has familial Mediterranean fever (with two mutations in the MEFV gene) and the other parent is an unaffected carrier (with one mutation in the MEFV gene), it may appear as if the affected child inherited the disorder only from the affected parent. This appearance of autosomal dominant inheritance when the pattern is actually autosomal recessive is called pseudodominance.
Where can I find information about diagnosis or management of familial Mediterranean fever?
These resources address the diagnosis or management of familial Mediterranean fever and may include treatment providers.
The resources on this site should not be used as a substitute for professional medical care or advice. Users seeking information about a personal genetic disease, syndrome, or condition should consult with a qualified healthcare professional. See How can I find a genetics professional in my area? in the Handbook.
Familial Mediterranean fever (FMF) is a hereditaryinflammatory disorder[1]:149. FMF is an autoinflammatory disease caused by mutations in MEFV, a gene which encodes a 781–amino acid protein denoted pyrin.[2]
The disorder has been given various names including familial paroxysmal polyserositis, periodic peritonitis, recurrent polyserositis, benign paroxysmal peritonitis, periodic disease or periodic fever, Reimann periodic disease or Reimann’s syndrome, Siegal-Cattan-Mamou disease, and Wolff periodic disease.[3][4][5] Note that “periodic fever” can also refer to any of thePeriodic fever syndromes.
There are seven types of attacks. Ninety percent of all patients have their first attacks before they are 18 years old. All develop over 2–4 hours and last anywhere from 6 hours to 4 days. Most attacks involve fever.[6]
Abdominal attacks, featuring abdominal pain, affect the whole abdomen with all signs of peritonitis (inflammation of abdominal lining), and acute abdominal pain likeappendicitis. They occur in 95% of all patients and may lead to unnecessary laparotomy. Incomplete attacks, with local tenderness and normal blood tests, have been reported.
Joint attacks mainly occur in large joints, especially in the legs. Usually, only one joint is affected. Seventy-five percent of all FMF patients experience joint attacks.
Chest attacks include pleuritis (inflammation of the pleura) and pericarditis (inflammation of the pericardium). Pleuritis occurs in 40% of patients, and makes it difficult to breathe or lie flat, but pericarditis is rare.
The diagnosis is clinically made on the basis of the history of typical attacks, especially in patients from the ethnic groups in which FMF is more highly prevalent. An acute phase response is present during attacks, with high C-reactive protein levels, an elevated white blood cell count and other markers of inflammation. In patients with a long history of attacks, monitoring the renal function is of importance in predicting chronic renal failure.[6]
A genetic test is also available to detect mutations in the MEFV gene. Sequencing of exons 2, 3, 5, and 10 of this gene detects an estimated 97% of all known mutations.[6]
A specific and highly sensitive test for FMF is the “Metaraminol Provocative Test (MPT),” whereby a single 10 mg infusion of Metaraminol is administered to the patient. A positive diagnosis is made if the patient presents with a typical, albeit milder, FMF attack within 48 hours. As MPT is more sensitive than specific, it does not identify all cases of FMF. Although a positive MPT can be very useful.[7][8]
Virtually all cases are due to a mutation in the MEFV gene on the sixteenth chromosome, which codes for a protein called pyrin or marenostrin. Various mutations of this gene lead to FMF, although some mutations cause a more severe picture than others. Mutations occur mainly in exons 2, 3, 5 and 10.[6]
The function of pyrin has not been completely elucidated, but it appears to be a suppressor of the activation of caspase 1, the enzyme that stimulates production of interleukin 1β, a cytokine central to the process of inflammation. In other words an ineffective pyrin doesn’t inhibit inflammation normally, resulting in inflammatory episodes of membranes at differing sites. It is not conclusively known what exactly sets off the attacks, and why overproduction of IL-1 would lead to particular symptoms in particular organs (e.g. joints or the peritoneal cavity).[6]
Familial Mediterranean fever has an autosomal recessive pattern of inheritance.
The MEFV gene is located on the short arm of chromosome 16 (16p13). The disorder inherits in an autosomal recessive fashion. Therefore, two asymptomatic carrier parents have a 25% chance of a child with the disorder, a 50% chance of a child who is an asymptomatic carrier and a 25% chance of a child who does not carry the disorder. FMF patients who have children with a carrier or another FMF patient have a 50% and 100% chance, respectively, of having a child with FMF.[9][10]
There is one known case of an affected patient with only one parent who is a carrier. This is caused by a unique mutation on thesixteenth chromosome.
Colchicine, a drug otherwise mainly used in gout, decreases attack frequency in FMF patients. The exact way in which colchicine suppresses attacks is unclear. While this agent is not without side effects (such as abdominal pain and muscle pains), it may markedly improve quality of life in patients. The dosage is typically 1–2 mg a day. Development of amyloidosis is delayed with colchicine treatment. Interferon is being studied as a therapeutic modality.[6] Some advise discontinuation of colchicine before and during pregnancy, but the data are inconsistent, and others feel it is safe to take colchicine during pregnancy.[11]
Approximately 5-10% of FMF cases are resistant to colchicine therapy alone. In these cases, adding anakinra to the daily colchicine regimen has been successful.[12]
A New York allergist, Dr Sheppard Siegal, first described the attacks of peritonitis in 1945; he termed this “benign paroxysmal peritonitis”, as the disease course was essentially benign.[13] Dr Hobart Reimann, working in the American University in Beirut, described a more complete picture which he termed “periodic disease”.[14][15]
In 1972, colchicine was discovered to prevent attacks.[16]
The link to the MEFV gene was discovered in 1997 by two different groups, each working independently – the French FMF Consortium,[9] and the International FMF Consortium.[10]
^ abcdefghij Livneh A, Langevitz P (2000). “Diagnostic and treatment concerns in familial Mediterranean fever”. Baillieres Best Pract Res Clin Rheumatol14 (3): 477–498.doi:10.1053/berh.2000.0089. PMID10985982.
^ Barakat MH, El-Khawad AO, Gumaa KA, El-Sobki NI, Fenech FF (1984). “Metaraminol provocative test: a specific diagnostic test for familial Mediterranean fever”. Lancet1(8378): 656–7. PMID6142351.
^ Huppertz HI, Michels H (1988). “[The metaraminol provocation test in the diagnosis of familial Mediterranean fever]”. Monatsschr Kinderheilkd136 (5): 243–5. PMID3405225.
^ ab The French FMF Consortium (1997). “A candidate gene for familial Mediterranean fever”. Nat. Genet.17 (1): 25–31. doi:10.1038/ng0997-25. PMID9288094.
^ ab The International FMF Consortium (1997). “Ancient missense mutations in a new member of the RoRet gene family are likely to cause familial Mediterranean fever”. Cell90(4): 797–807. doi:10.1016/S0092-8674(00)80539-5. PMID9288758.
^ Goldfinger, S.E. (1972-12-21). “Colchicine for familial Mediterranean fever”. New England Journal of Medicine287 (25): 1302. doi:10.1056/NEJM197212212872514.PMID4636899.
In addition to the Colchicine, I recommend a regimen of ingesting Phoenix Tears Oil (hash oil made from the cannabis plant) by mouth in concert with smoking the plant to treat pain and juicing the fan leaves to decrease intestinal symptoms and increase appetite.
~ Do all that you can to cultivate peace within yourself, that it might
shine out from you, and plant the seed of peace in other spirits, for them
to cultivate.~{Remember… it is when we choose act on the issues that are in front of
our faces, when we choose to get involved instead of looking the other way
as our fellow man struggles, when we choose to take those small simple
little actions, working on righting little wrongs in our everyday lives that
really make change happen, those seemingly small actions are what really
make the world a better place and are a catalyst for greater social change.}
~Both quotes by Breedheen “Bree” O’Rilley Keefer~
A friend of mine travels a lot an makes regular stops by my “high mountain” home to toke out and brainstorm. Recently, she dropped in with a few strains from some spots in Colorado Springs. This is the first in a series of “reviews by proxy” Having someone play “secret shopper” for me cuts down on the chances that I will get superior herb to other patients because they know it is for a review. Asking to do the review after the medication sample is already in my hands by way of a compassionate friend also cuts out the need for a dispensary to actually have a heart to get a review.
my assessment, through a reliable proxy…. and a small sample of my own. their grower knows their business…. the owners are not so good…. overpriced, and rude. not only that, their website contains NONE of their own content or any real help to a patient at all.
Just a few miles away at JP Wellness, you can get the same quality herb (often better) and much more reasonable prices, with friendly budtends and a all around nicer experience…. Oh, and as a full disclosure thing…. Yes, spoke to the owners myself and I offered PPCC a review. They did not want one…. I decided that you all deserved to know what we found there anyway.
herb experience 7 of 10 medicinal leaves (overpriced)
overall: 3 of 10 medical leaves
About the Reviews and how to get one.
Are you a Colorado dispensary who would like your herb reviewed and a video made by The Art of Breezy Kiefair? I will come to you to pick up my review sample or have a friend do it for me…. What about seed banks? I’m a great grower and would love to review your genetics… An author? get me a copy of your book…. a pipe blower? send me a pipe… or any other artistic and/or other canna-related product?
I ONLY REVIEW BASED ON YOUR COMPASSION…. quantity of compassion is not important…. Quality of the product is what i review… Being compassionate gets your foot in the door. Positive reviews are never guaranteed. I give only my blunt and honest assessment…. If you think you have the goods, step up…
The more I love the product, the longer I will promote your product line for your little bit of compassion… that’s how the reviews work…. plain and simple. wanna know more? btokeefer@gmail.com
i have happy review-ees you can speak to about it as references.
Some would say I hustle medication…. I’d say….. looking to see who has a heart where so that low income people close by can know where their limited dollars go the farthest….. so that people get business who have hearts and deserve it…. and if i see something wrong, well… that goes in to… I pull no punches.
Whew! These Occupy posts are far more difficult to pry from myself than their predecessors; the hands-on mechanics of putting the earlier stuff into practice in the present world, amongst the isolated pools of individuated consciousness we humans represent, each with his or her own vision of the whole, has been at the very least disorienting. I’ve lately revived an old motto i swiped from the good people at Oat Willie’s down in Austin, Texas: Onward Through the Fog! How odd is it that i’ve recently connected with some folks that hark back to that place in ways that are deeply surreal. Oat Willie’s and Fat Freddie will seem to be completely out of place in this bit, in which i mean to address the notion of cooperation amongst disparate factions, but not permanently i hope. By the end of this post, i hope to connect Occupy, The Tea Party, disparate passions, and yes, Hippies. It will be necessary to engage in some relatively surreal thinking.Last night on a new Facebook page, “UNITE: OCCUPY,” (cap lock and all), i got into a conversation about this stuff started by a guy that asked whether anyone thought a joint event between Occupiers and Tea Partiers might be possible. Sure, i said, our Colorado Springs group had lots of Tea Partiers among its earliest enthusiasts, and although many have pulled away, there still exists a close association with many that veer sharply toward the Te Party camp, especially among Ron Paulsupporters. The common ground Occupy shares with the Tea Party, at least t a grass root level, is substantial. There can be no doubt of the equally substantial differences. I suspect that it would take some pretty serious ideological barnstorming to bring the two camps together, but nothing prevents the groups from at least tentative discussion to find commonalities.Tonight our Occupy group staged a talk by Tea Party stalwart, ConstitutionalistMike Holler. Mike seemed for all appearances to be an earnest and well-versed supporter of Constitutional “fundamentalism,” if you will. He peppered his talk with lots of my favorite quotes from my favorite founding fathers. He got a little testy about the revisionist history his kids bring home from college early on–perhaps indicative of one point of separation between Occupiers and Tea Partiers. Some of those are important. Occupy is international, where the Tea Party can display degrees of jingoism. I, personally, respect the earnest efforts of our Enlightenment founders, but recognize that they were flawed, and aver that their document was dated by racist, sexist, and elitist provisions and thinking that they might be excused from by noting their temporal milieu. We don’t have the same luxury. Occupy is legitimately grass root, supported by sweat and blood more than funded, where TP is, or at least became very quickly corporately funded “AstroTurf,” disingenuously proffering libertarian ideals as a smoke screen for corporate license to plunder. Occupiers are in my experience far more diverse than Tea Partiers. Socialist and Anarchist Occupiers are common, as are assorted races, genders, orientations, and religious persuasions, where Tea Partiers seem to my limited observation to be relatively homogeneously white Christian capitalist patriots. Mike interjected that both groups had been misrepresented by the media, and that seems likely to be so given that mainstream media seems content to misrepresent ’bout anything they report in this country, but Fox news and the rabid right like the Tea Party so much i have to wonder if he’s fallen victim to a personal soft spot.Mike spoke eloquently enough in his effort to simplify the Constitution, focusing on issues of freedom, and state’s rights. He said very little with which i could find disagreement. He pointed out two major points of confluence between Occupy and the Tea Party–personal liberty, and a rally-cry, “No more Bailouts!” I suspect he fastidiously avoided some points he knew or at least feared might be contentious, like for example the ludicrous assertions i’ve heard often that environmental warnings from the scientific community stem from some kind of Satanic control scheme from the–well just whom is never too clear. The Vatican or something. Commies, i guess. That just maybe the best way for Tea Partiers and Occupiers to interact, though, for now, concentrating on the common aversion to what amounts to Fascism. Interacting from that perspective could exclude much conversation. It could put the Tea Party in the same position as the Occupy movement, after their Fascist sponsors withdraw in horror. Whatever. We Occupiers got on just fine with Tea Party Mike–“Mr. Constitution.”Mike largely expressed notions we Occupiers could embrace. I suppose he could have done a bit of research and tailored his speech toward that end, but i think we just agree; he seemed a grassroot kind of guy, to me. He briefly alluded to schisms within the Tea Party, and there’s no sensible reason to avoid acknowledging the same within Occupy. Last night’s event was attended by Occupy people that have had such extreme altercations in their attempts to wrestle a semblance of ideological unity from a stubbornly liquid platform that it could easily enough have disintegrated into bedlam. I attended with my dear friend Thomas, with whom i often disagree. In fact, he and i often disagree so strongly that sometimes i feel like smacking him in back of the head. I expect he feels the same way about me at times. Maybe much of the time. Take note, war-mongers of the world: Thomas is a great guy, and even though we disagree with one another, sometimes strongly, neither of us has smacked the other in back of the head. Get it?So here we were last night, disparate Occupiers engaging a Tea Party mouthpiece in a room full of people that have all experienced the vagaries of human interaction under a fairly pressurized circumstance over the past few months. No butterflies fluttered around the room, but no one worked up a bickering session, either. We worked together. All of us. One could recall the old adage that “The enemy of my enemy is my friend,” but that would be devolution. I prefer to imagine that those with arguments present recognized the futility of scrapping amongst friends, if only below the radar of their Egos. Whether my nobler hopes for those pained souls in the room last night are valid or not, the assertions i made in these non-pages well before Occupy began remain true. The system we wrestle against is collapsing around our heads. And the solution is spiritual, to a far greater extent than it is temporal.Fat Freddy is a comic book character that lives in Denver. Seriously. I met him a little while ago. (This only seems out of place, i promise.) Mr. Constitution Mike Holler expressed the opinion last night that our American republic, our constitutional federation of states, is in its final throes; that we are in a position where, ” it’s too late to save the country, but too early to start shooting.” Mike seemed tentative in expressing his hope that God might pull some kind of supernatural rabbit from his celestial hat to resolve our monumental national woes. I expect he feared perturbing the often non-Christian sensibilities of the Occupiers. He needn’t have worried quite so much–we may be largely skeptical of literal interpretations, but we’re pretty tolerant of that sort of thing. When i met Fat Freddy–an icon of counter-cultural activism important to me since childhood, an old-school Hippie with connection to the most famous and infamous of that crowd–he singled me out and pulled me aside to explain in some detail his expectation for a spiritual upheaval in coming days. Freddy’s taken up with the Urantia Book, a tomei’ve heard Christians disparage as devilish. I couldn’t see anything devilish about what he showed me. He earnestly explained his expectation for resolution. Soon.We had come to Denver to talk about foreclosures and bank jiggery-pokery with another guy, and pulled up at Freddy’s house without knowing it. It just happened that way. These old Hippies like Tea Party fave, Ron Paul. (Follow along, now, i know it’s weird, and yeah, i know a lot of Occupiers don’t like Paul; i’m not sure about him myself). Also in attendance at that meeting was a woman i had been conversing with on line for quite a while in the context of Occupy. It took me nearly through the whole meeting to recognize her, because i knew her to live down in the Four Corners neighborhood of Colorado. She lives at Freddy’s now. This juxtaposition is so weird that now i’m expecting the Mad Hatter, or Lewis Carroll himself to pop up at some meeting quoting from Jabberwocky. Mike Holler holds out for resolution to the country’s woes in a traditional Christian context. My own suspicion, shared with J.B.S. Haldane, is that the Universe is not only queerer than we suppose, but queerer than we can suppose. But somewhere in the mix i am convinced that some divineThing many of us think of as God is deeply interested in the little proceedings here on our little blue marble and that our interactions are subsequently and necessarily thus influenced.
We live right here. We have no choice but to manage things on a coarse, physical level; but we also live, i think, on an overlapping and less tangible plane, where we have more influence than we might ordinarily imagine. At the same time, things seem to occur there without our conscious direction. We’ll need to keep plugging away at things like grasping the Constitution, and taking on massive, quixotic quests like fighting banks and a world full of renegade, intransigent governments and power brokers, not to mention our own internal battles, as finely defined as within our own Souls. We’ll need to recognize the Truth in one another, even when it’s obscured by a bunch of worldly disagreement and fog. And so far as i can tell, were learning. Whatever that means.
The below piece is to be published in the next issue of Cannabis Health News Magazine whose editor is Jason Lauve. Jason was acquitted of all charges by a jury on August 6, 2009. He has been a tireless advocate for Medical Marijuana patients in Colorado before this date and since.
Kiefair Keepsakes…. How we came to be, Why we give back
Copyrighted material All Rights Reserved see message at the bottom of essay
I tell you this story, not for myself, but for those in similar situations without the strength or ability to speak.
The government of the United States and the State of Colorado (as well as other states) are all saving a ton of money due to the growth in the medical marijuana industry and so are the dispensaries and caregivers. As a patient caught in the middle, I decided that I may have a unique perspective on this issue and have decided to throw my two cents in on the topic.
If you listen to the news, it seems to be the government officials vs. the dispensary owners. here in Colorado. This should not be the case. The patients needs should be at the heart of this discussion, particularly the needs of low income medical marijuana patients on Social Security Disability and Social Security Income (SSD/SSI)
I posted much of the content you will read here all over the internet in an effort to help myself and others in my position. I sat in the online forums begging:
“Is there someone, anyone out there who hears my plea and wants to help me actually do something other than sit in online forums and complaining about the problem and hope someone does something”
I was heartbroken to find little positive response and a lot of negative/cruel responses by persons who clearly are recreational users and not medical users. The treatment of women in some of these cannabis forum rooms was often appalling. I finally decided to stop beating a dead horse and set up a store front to help me get the funds I need for my own medicine, food and other needs and to donate 10% of our profits to provide medical marijuana for free to low income patients in need. Currently we have only one dispensary signed on with us, GreenBelly Co-op LLC in Eldorado Springs, Co.
We encourage other dispensaries and caregivers to join with us in this effort. The funds to be donated will be held in trust and dispensed when/where they are needed according to the needs and location of the patient in question. A patient from your area would contact me, then I would contact you to confirm you have the stock necessary for the patient and to confirm availability of time, I would then deposit money for their medication into a paypal account owned by your dispensary. The patient could then come in and pick up their necessary medicine. I require no investment on your part. Patients would report on the quality of your medicine and I would then write their reviews and forward their recommendations (no names attached) on the net. Everybody wins. People who wish to provide money for the trust can purchase anything in my online gift-store or my personal catalog. 10% of my profits go to this fund. Hopefully a larger and larger percentage of profits will got to the trust when my personal finances allow me.
When I began to write the essay that I posted in the online forums, I decided that my joining the Medical Marijuana Registry was my Christmas Present to the American Taxpayer for the year 2009. And posted the title as “My Personal Christmas Gift to the American Taxpayer.”
Now, you may imagine me as the stereotype of a “stoner” that has been created by the media. Let me correct you
First of all, I am a female over 25 and under 40 with severe and debilitating Fibromyalgia, the kind that forces doctors to shake their heads and prescribe one ineffective man made medicine on top of another while I waste away and my quality of life diminishes. The onset of my symptoms began almost instantly after my birth in Canon City, CO and I have been fragile ever since. I’ve even been told by a doctor or two that may well have one of the worst Fibromyalgia cases on record. I was a ward of the State of Colorado until I ran away when I was 16 due to horrid abusive conditions within the state foster care program and completed my high school in another state.
My sole health insurance is provided to me is under medicare/medicaid. This is because I am completely disabled and the doctors do not allow me to work, or even to attend school. I assure you that this is only for the time being… I am getting stronger all the time!
In 1994, I was awarded Ginsberg Scholarship up at Naropa during the 20th anniversary festival. I dreamed for years of attending, but my health prevented it. I finally got stubborn and bullied my doctors into letting me go. I was accepted into and attended Naropa University for two semesters in 2007-2008 school year in an effort to get a degree that would give me access to jobs more suited to my bodies abilities, and was pulled out by my doctors both times. Naropa wanted me there, I wanted to be there, but government programs required I be enrolled a certain amount of credit hours (beyond the abilities of my body) in order to keep my funding. I attempted a semester at Grand Canyon University online in Fall 2008 to the same effect. Now I have many thousands of dollars in student loans I can’t pay because I attempted to get a degree so I could get a job my body could handle.
I was forced to be on government programs like Social Security Disability and Social Security Income (SSD/SSI) at a young age. I was in middle school when I was put on SSD/SSI for the first time while I was a ward of the State of Colorado.
Let me clarify, the first time I was put on disability, I was a minor and the State decided as my sole legal guardian to place me on disability. The state “adopted me” in a sense.My name was changed legally and my parents rights to me as a child were formally, legally and permanently terminated. None of it was not my choice (except the name change after years of foster care), it was not discussed with me, I was a child. My medical care as a child was much as it is now, with the exception of the fact that kids get a bit more coverage. Being on the program at a young age, I did not accumulate much in the way of work money in my SSI account, although I did attempt to work several times. Unfortunately every time, an employer or doctor would get tired of me being sick and put a stop to it one way or another. That is why my monthly amounts from SSI/SSD are so low, not because I am disabled, but because I couldn’t work to pay into the system like the people who receive these benefits only when they reach retirement after a full life of paying in. Also did you know the government actually Penalized people for getting married if you are both on disability? They treat you as one person and give you one person’s pay! For love, and for spiritual reasons I decided that was a risk I would just have take. So, I married my love who happened to be on disability also anyway.
Now I ask the members of the Government of the Great State of Colorado, if you had an adult child who was sick and suffering would you leave them to languish in pain and poverty just because it was no longer your legal responsibility? Of course you wouldn’t. You would do whatever was in your power to make your child as comfortable as possible.
As an adult child, I now boldly but humbly step up to my adopted parent, the Government of the State of Colorado, and ask, “Guardian Colorado, do you it intend to focus on the dispensaries who are the money in this discussion, or do you intend to focus on your citizens whose LIVES are being saved by this plant? You discuss care giving so much in this debate, but the treatment of patients on the part of many in this debate has proven differently. I know you have hearts, please use them as you consider these policies. This shouldn’t be a partisan issue. This should be a people issue.
Before I was placed on the Colorado Medical Marijuana Registry in June 2009, I would have to visit a doctors office several times a month, sometimes several times a week, sometimes with several appointments booked the same day with specialists and tests, painful and difficult physical therapy that seemed to harm more than hurt, etc., and there were to many trips to the emergency room to count.
I went to the ER out of sheer desperation, I went just so I could get comfortable enough to have a bit of sleep after a week or more of lingering in a painful place that seemed to be located in deep within the realm of a narcotic distorted pain haze, a no-where-land that seemed to be somewhere between life and death. The doctors in the emergency room and elsewhere often treated me as though I was an addict, and not a pain patient, AND I WAS MISERABLE!
Since I was approved for the medical marijuana registry I haven’t needed near the amount of services from the medicaid/medicare program. In fact, I’ve had to see a doctor twice since June 3, 2009 when the doctor signed my forms.
Once to have 14 teeth pulled, a little bit of dental work made necessary by a combination of years of no dental benefits unless my teeth couldn’t be saved and needed to be pulled, being on narcotics for almost a decade, and dealing with severe nausea/vomiting/malnutrition.
The other doctor visit (and medications that followed) were for a bad cold that I caught at the dentists office. I haven’t seen a doctor at all otherwise, although I do call my family doctor to check in and let her know I am doing well.
Before I was on the MMJ registry, I was on so many medications (20 plus medications taken at various intervals though the day) that I felt like I was taking a pill every 2 minutes…. Number of traditional prescriptions I take daily now – ZERO.
Now the government was paying for all those medications I was on before through medicare/medicaid, plus all the doctor visits to get, maintain, and change dosing on those prescriptions right? Some of those medications by themselves cost the government thousands of dollars a month! Many could not have refills on them by law and required a doctor visit every time I needed more.
I always felt guilty about my personal burden on the American Taxpayers. But now I don’t have to feel guilty cause I have given a present to the American Taxpayer. I got on the MMJ registry. Now I do not go to the mainstream doctor unless I need antibiotics. I am off all prescriptions. I had tobacco quit (been trying for 20 years to quit) until I was without medicine too long and got stressed out, but I plan to quit again.
I and am well enough to manage a website as well as volunteer and be an advocate for others in need. I have regularly traded my services in clerical/computer work either from home or in the GreenBelly Coop LLC office for medications when I am strapped for cash. All of these things would have been impossible for me nine short months ago when I was all but bedridden and and in so much pain I had to keep myself from overdosing.
The government is saving many thousands of dollars a month on me alone, and yet I have to struggle to obtain this money saver for the American taxpayer. That much cut in government spending on the part of an individual… I should get a medal or something. Now think how many individuals are saving the government this money in the State of Colorado alone…. Let alone the other 13 states and the District of Columbia! We all need medals or medicine at the very least!
How many others are there like me? Meanwhile, the price of my medicine increases as the MMJ movement grows. My family and I have been stuck having to make really hard decisions like, do we pawn our wedding and engagement rings to get my medicine? Or do we pawn them and buy some food? Or do we keep the rings for sentimental reasons, lay here and just starve and have seizures from pain and lack of medicine/food.
I ended up pawning all the rings, having already sold else of value to the pawn store and bought both medicine and food. The money I received for my treasured bands did not buy nearly enough of either medicine or food. We promised ourselves we would get them back, but I ended up crying my eyes out when I realized I just can’t afford to get them out of hock. The deadline to get them back passed weeks ago. I live in a Winnebago and have been in real danger of starving to death at times. Now don’t get me wrong, my life has been profoundly changed by this medicine, and any hardship I may have to endure is truly worth the benefits of this plant. I will not compromise and go back to the narcotics and other prescriptions just because I can get them paid for or for any other reason. I would rather be in pain when I am without my medical marijuana than take a morphine and get sicker.
Sometimes family members and the community can make it very hard to be a low income medical marijuana patient too. I have heard many stories of people not living with family/friends any longer because they are shunned for their medicinal use. I’ve experienced this shunning first hand myself. The stereotype of the “typical” marijuana user is further damaging these people with no where else to turn!
This herb is profoundly changing lives! It is healing people, body, mind, and soul. Yet its legal users get treated as if they are using it for recreation. I believe recreational use is a VALID use of the plant, further I feel it be legalized and would be an important source of revenue for America if it were to be legal once again. However, that is not why I personally NEED this plant.
This plant allows me to eat, to sleep, to get out of my bed, to manage my pain enough to have a job, to be involved with life instead of living in a nightmare world just praying for the end to come soon. If you happen to be a Fibromyalgia patient praying for the end, you can be praying for a long time as this is not a terminal disease.
The Mayo clinic website (see footnote 1) describes symptoms of Fibromyalgia as including
Signs and symptoms of fibromyalgia can vary, depending on the weather, stress, physical activity or even the time of day.
Widespread pain and tender points
The pain associated with fibromyalgia is described as a constant dull ache, typically arising from muscles. To be considered widespread, the pain must occur on both sides of your body and above and below your waist.
Fibromyalgia is characterized by additional pain when firm pressure is applied to specific areas of your body, called tender points. Tender point locations include:
Back of the head, Between shoulder blades, Top of shoulders, Front sides of neck, Upper chest,Outer elbows, Upper hips, Sides of hips, Inner knees
Fatigue and sleep disturbances
People with fibromyalgia often awaken tired, even though they seem to get plenty of sleep. Experts believe that these people rarely reach the deep restorative stage of sleep. Sleep disorders that have been linked to fibromyalgia include restless legs syndrome and sleep apnea.
Co-existing conditions
Many people who have fibromyalgia also may have:
And a whole host of other conditions not on the Mayo clinic list.
Moder Western medicine can’t even agree on the causes/mechanisms of this disease because they don’t understand it.
It has been suggested that this is a psychological disease only, a psychosis created when a hypocondriac hears about fibromyalgia. The advocates of this theory say that the symptoms of this diesease are all in the patient’s head. I do not personally believe in this theory, but even if this disease is all in my head, the medical marijuana still helps.
Other sources on Fibromyalgia suspect that this disease has been around for all time, a genetic disease with a trigger, and its symptoms are found even in individuals of remote tribes of Africa and the Amazon who have no contact with the west. So why should I use new untested man-made medicine created by people who don’t understand my disease and possibly believe it doesn’t exist? Especially when that disease has been treated with herbs known to posses pain relieving qualities for many generations of humans?
Personally, my last completely “pain free” moment was around 3:30 PM on August 21, 2002. I know because I keep a detailed pain/medication journal in an effort to regulate my condition. I am confident that If I had the proper medicine, I would have pain free moments again. This herb doesn’t just treat pain sensations, it helps correct causes. Perhaps with the right regimen, daily pain could be a thing of the past for me.
This disease itself may not kill you, but it can certainly make you wish for death. There are near epidemic levels of Fibromyalgia patients and pain patients in general who are hurting so bad they are suicidal, or worse succeed in taking their own life. I have a brother who died as a result of a doctor who wasn’t paying enough attention with his pen and prescription pad. After years of pain and suffering following a head injury, my brother died of a drug interaction prescribed by his doctor.
Dispensaries are necessary, but not without a social conscience
Now the other side of the coin. It is no secret that the people who own dispensaries are making money on patients like me too.
We need these dispensaries for a variety of reasons.
1)What would a patient do if their caregiver had a bad crop and was without medicine? If that paitent was restricted from seeing other caregivers they would have no where to get their medicine but the street.
2) Our caregivers are restricted to a number of plants they can grow for you, thus if you become tolerant to the genetics of one strain of medicine quickly and need to change the genetics of you medication often, it may be difficult for your caregiver to have/maintain the variety you need.
3) Competition strengthens customer service and prevents patients from being in a form of bondage by their caregiver. If we restrict patients from going to other dispensaries, how are they to know if the medicine they are receiving is the best quality available for them. If we restrict the number of persons a dispensary can serve to a tiny number and prevent patients from seeing other medical marijuana providers, and in addition the number of times a year they can change their caregiver, then patients must settle for whatever medicine a particular caregiver is giving them whether it is effective or not.
We need a program to help low income patients get their medicine!
If you are low income and can’t afford your “mainstream pharmacy” medicine, you can go to various organizations and they will help you to buy your medicine, sometimes even on a regular basis if they are necessary and not covered by insurance, but that doesn’t include medical marijuana.
If you are brave enough to speak up and ask for help getting your medicine at these organizations, you will probably find the door closed firmly in your face. You may also find that other services from the organization become difficult or impossible to obtain as well. This is out and out discrimination in my opinion. If your medicine is MMJ no one is willing to help you unless you happen to be lucky enough to find a care giver who actually gives a care if you have medicine or not! I just put my medical costs on a new food stamp application mailed 1/13/09 to Boulder County. We shall see what happens.
“So what,” you say? Well let’s look at this… The high price can force a person in my position to go back to buying their medicine off the street where it is less expensive, but also less potent, less safe.
1)You never know what has been added to you herb to increase the genetically weak herbs potency artificially with other street drugs or various substances to make it seem as though there is more weight to the medicine.
2)It is much more dangerous to obtain, and the process of obtaining it can be a risk to your health in many ways. Long periods in the cold and encounters with strange germs can put a person right back in their sick bed or the hospital.
3) The money spent on street grade medication often goes back to fund gang and criminal activity. This is something that most medical marijuana patients do not want to support and got on the registry to stop supporting. I personally counted avoiding purchasing on the street as one of the largest pluses to getting on the registry, and yet I see people like me being forced back there.
4) The price of cannabis on the street directly influences the costs of Medical Grade in the Dispensaries. In this respect, Cannabis is a commodity like any other, and as such is subject to price fluctuation when artificially influenced. It doesn’t really have anything to do with how much it costs to grow it and transport it to the patient. It has to do with how much it costs on the street.
What is to be done if you have no medicine? Where can you go?
There are few funds or organizations willing to help people like me get my medicine when I can’t afford it, and you have to really dig in your need to find them. When I did find them, they could only help once or not at all due to the demand. Many patients do not have the strength for this search when they are lacking appropriate medication. It took me months of daily web crawling to dig any up organizations up. Now people who wish to help provide medicine to people in this position can buy something for themselves or someone else, something they may have bought anyway and someone gets medicine.
If someone who has medicine/money wants to help a person in my position, likewise there is no way for a person who wants to help to donate money to people in a position similar to mine. Right now low income persons only relief seems to be individuals/churches/caregivers being kind. So I created this gift company, and here we are.
One church I know of is greenfaith ministry. The Reverend of greenfaith ministry is also known as the 420 Reverend. I have had contact with Reverend Brandon Baker from this organization who is a great man. He drove over 50 miles to get me some medicine for free. Unfortunately he is one man and the demand is high. Rev. B Baker is quoted as saying, “Tell the (Denver City my edit) counsel a majority amount of local churches support un-regulated access for all needy mmj patients, give them my name and number if they say they want to meet with any of the spiritual mmj community church leaders!”
Meds for free? What about Caregivers and Growers needs?
Now, I have no problem with the idea of paying for my medications… The person who grows it provides a service that a dollar amount really can’t be placed on and should be compensated, and so should everyone involved in getting the medicine to me. That is only fair. But I want know the money I spend helps others like me or at very least the movement in general. I also don’t need to be paying 50+% of my income to stay barely comfortable. I’d like to be able to pay a reasonable percentage of my income and have all the medicine my body requires. I know that may seem a little unrealistic, but a girl in pain can dream. lol
Here in Colorado it is the wild wild west right now. If I happen to have to go somewhere other than my primary caregiver, my $ will probably end up in a growing bank account of some green gold rush eyed caregiver who could really care less if I have effective medication or not. In fact, it seems like the only green anyone cares about is dollar bill green and the green of greed. Yet the right to visit a dispensary other than your caregiver is a necessary one. What happens if your caregiver loses a grow? What do you do if you need a different strain of medicine than what is available that day? What if they are out of the product that helps the most? Would you refuse to let me go to W@(m@rt if W@lgr33ns was out of my prescription?
So the government ignores the money it saves, and many (not all) of the dispensaries in the area seem to have little social conscience about the price a person like me can pay to have their medicine.
A Big social Problem, and Yet We aren’t the Issue, money is.
When your total family income is at or below poverty levels, you can absolutely be forced back on the streets to get your medicine. My medical condition requires a minimum of 1/8 oz of smoke-able every 2 days to just to keep me off narcotics and other prescriptions that do more harm than good, not crying, not having seizures caused by pain, and not be stuck in bed.
This dosing by no means keeps me comfortable it is important to note.
I have NEVER had the pleasure of having enough medicine on hand to decide on what a good “comfortable” dosing schedule would be, even though I do have a compassionate caregiver. I just don’t want to put my poor caregiver out of business taking care of my needs.
What I am trying to say is that there is something fundamentally very wrong with the fact that there are so many people who are to poor to even know what the appropriate dosage of medication for their amount of pain, yet the government is saving a bunch of cash and the Medical Marijuana industry is getting the “lion’s share” of the rest of their income.
It is frustrating to feel like you and others are falling through the cracks even further. Many in my position were barely hanging on before the economic downturn, and now see no light at the end of the tunnel. SSI/SSD keeps you far below the poverty line if you have been unable to work enough many living on $1000 a month or less for their whole family.
It is frustrating to see others get wealthy off of you and others while your tier of society starves. Sometimes I feel invisible, and I know for a fact I am not the only one out there feeling this.
Why do the out of state interests get a louder voice than ours?
I was born in the State of Colorado. My family has lived in this state for 4 generations (or more.) My grandmother owned and operated the Historic Stirrup Ranch near Canon City, Co. for many years. I love Colorado, but I live in an RV and am so desperate to be in a place where I can have food and medicine that I am willing to move to any state with a registry because the climate here is so difficult for patients right now.
I have a plan so that if I were able to obtain some land, I could be self sufficient (NO MORE SSI/SSD and I could actually contribute to charities instead of needing help from them!) and never have to worry about being hungry or without my necessary medicine. In time, many others could be helped with food and medicine grown on the land. I could be fulfilling needs rather than begging to have my needs filled.
Kiefair Keepsakes, stepping stone to a dream
My dream is to be able to get some land and set up an initial grow op in earth ships (a growing movement of building practices with an all environmentally friendly building/management philosophy.) This initial grow op would end up growing into a Nonprofit Medical Marijuana retreat/community/caregiver for patients like me to be able to get their medicine and/or live in a more affordable and kind setting, using their personal talents and abilities to benefit the community. I want to focus on what a “disabled person” can do, not their limitations. I want to create a place where it is safe to be sick on a daily basis with no fear of hunger, lack of medication, or fear of the loss of a job/home due to illness.
While I have the heart and the ability to do this work (given time and medication), I unfortunately have no capital for such a venture and am praying the universe will see fit to make it happen.
I have researched many aspects of this and it is very feasible, however getting investment in such a venture is not my forte. This kind of setting would be great tool for a “for profit” dispensary to use. It would be publicity, demonstrate social conscience, and you could also offer my nonprofit medications cheap to their own low income patients. inquire further at kiefair.keepsakes@gmail.com
I just wanna say Thanks to all the people out there helping to make it possible for people who need this medicine to have it. Whatever you celebrate this or any season, may it be meaningful and may Blessings come to you all!
Kiefair.com DIY cannabis and more 
