Teach your children well............

In the beginning, acid was fun. Soon, choc mesc and orange sunshine grew into eight way and blotter acid and casualities quickly began to appear. Those that continued with its use became the jesters of the group as their thoughts and speech mimiced a bad Cheech and Chong movie.
As drug use began to become more diverse with the addition of coke, rocket fuel and opium,some just held fast to marijuana use while some returned to their parents liquid drug of choice The one clear goal shared by all was just getting fucked up.
By high school's end, G crashed his bicycle and died of head injuries while S crashed his Honda 175 into a tree and died on the spot. After a big house party where C won the full pot after a night of poker, turned up murdered two weeks later. W left the same party and crashed his vette never getting out of 2nd gear, also dying on the spot. P & H hit a tree killing O and leaving P with the brain of an eight year old. JM shot himself. SL also shot himself. P hung himself. J fell off a third story porch while tossing empty beer cases into the dumpster below. And somehow, MD seemed to survive it all.
His brain was cheese from so much acid and he fit the role of jester well. It appeared that death had made a wide sweep and that it was now finished.
Several years later MD's body was pulled bloated and unrecognizable from a small pond not too far from his home.
At a function almost fifteen years later, I encountered the brother in law of a friend who also suffered from years of acid use and was now on psychotropics to help stabilize his mood. He became teary and relayed to me the story of MD's demise. It seems that MD, the B in law, SE and another male, and a girl were fucked up; throwing rocks into the pond.
MD hit the girl with a rock by accident. In turn, they hit MD and threw him in the pond where he drowned.
SE died several years later sitting barside from his many years of self abuse. I'm not sure whatever happened to the rest of the crew........
I used to coach little league. My two sons were on the team. I would often spend time with them before bed each night and relay to them the dangers of drug abuse and irresponsible behaviors. I had many examples, both dead and alive from which to draw examples from. It appeared to sink in. It didn't!
My oldest son is a recovering heroin addict and the younger has been a drug dealer in town and a heavy cocaine user.
The Reagan years spawned the phrase, "Just say no." Now, it is, "Talk to your children. They will listen."
I did....They didn't....