Puff, Pass & Ponder: Stoned in the Middle Ages
There is literally almost nothing more exciting for an incredibly hungry person than being encouraged to eat an entire roasted chicken with your bare hands. Add to this the fact that you’re completely stoned out of your gourd. To be stoned in the middle ages is a dream come true.
“You have corn on your face”, said my seatmate and best friend since age 13. We were a group of 30-something women celebrating a 35th birthday at Shaumberg, IL’s famed Medieval Times. “All over your face,” she said as I attempted to wipe my mouth off. “Seriously, it’s on your forehead.” Ever the resourceful one, she had snuck in a set of plastic silverware and was attempting to cut her potato with it. The tines kept snapping off.
Even though I am, at heart, a corn-fed Midwestern girl who loves her meat and cheese and beer, I’ve been trying recently to make consciously healthier choices, and one of these is attempting to drink less alcohol and instead consume edibles in awkward situations where I might normally be tempted to have many many drinks. I don’t completely abstain (I love my wine) but I find that with edibles instead of multiple cocktails, I’m able to sit back and really appreciate the show– whether that be entertaining conversation, live music, drunk people dancing, or a display of admittedly impressive medieval falconry and equestrian artistry. Bonus: I’m never hungover and can instead enjoy my coffee and on a good day, a morning run.
I’m an edibles lightweight and probably will always be, even though I can consume flower all day and still be at the tip-top of my game, but I had popped an appropriate amount of infused mints– enough to give Medieval Times the sense of childlike wonder I had also experienced at age 9 when my grandparents brought me. However, this time I was way less into the horses, and way more into the rippling thighs and stretchy “chain mail” outfits clutching them.
When I looked around the lobby after the show, the birthday girl was getting knighted, another friend was doing kick flips to demonstrate her valor, and a third was giving out her business card to our assigned knight who had long flowing blonde locks and bulging calves. “It smells like skunk, Heidi is that your weed?” somebody screamed. “I work in banking” I overhead my friend telling the red knight, our savior. I figured she would soon regret giving out her work email to “Sir Tim”, as she has a super high-powered finance position and the government monitors all of her correspondence.
The sober-stoned of us managed to wrangle the rest of the troupe to the parking lot and out of the main hall, where they were scaring the children who just wanted to wave flags with crests and learn about medieval torture. “You can’t twerk there… stop, stop twerking”, I said as we bundled our friends into a Lyft van. Sweet Jesus, I need more weed.
To read more musings to make you ponder, click here.