An Open Letter to my Nephew

I was talking to my brother recently and found out that my nephew is turning into one of those “troubled teens” that you hear about. I know the chances that he’ll read this are minimal, but I feel like I’ve got to say something, so I guess my blog is good as anyplace to give him a piece of my mind. Here goes...

Dude! WTF are you thinking!? You’re only fourteen years old! You’re not old enough to drive, but you seem to think that you’re wise enough to start smoking cigarettes. You’re too young to vote, but you think you’re smart enough to 'know' that smoking pot at such a young age isn’t going to cause you any problems. You think you’re too smart for school, but you’re failing your classes. You think you’re too slick for the cops, but you’re on probation. You surmise you don’t need your dad, so you disrespect and alienate him. You don’t believe that rules apply to you, so you stay out late with your loser friends. I can tell you where you’re headed, but you’re at that age where you think what I say won’t apply to you… because you think you’re smarter than that.

Bullshit! Listen up kid, and listen good. I’m going to tell you what you don’t want to hear. Not only am I going to tell you what you don’t want to hear, but I’m going to tell you so there’s no mistaking what I’m saying. I’m going to tell you this in plain English, so even if you choose not to listen to me, you won’t be able to say ‘Nobody told me' when the shit I’m going to say happens to you. Hey! Pay attention to me boy! I’m over here, not on that damn video game! Get your ears out of that MP3 player and focus on your uncle. Your mom may let you tune her out, but I'm not your mom. Your dad may let you walk away from him, but I’m not playing that game. You’d better lock your nasty little eyeballs on my face. You’d better forget about the skate park, and get your attention on my words. That’s better. The sooner you listen to me, the sooner we’ll be done with this talk. The sooner you start doing what I’m talking about, the less you’ll suffer. Trust me, I know what I’m talking about.

How do I know what I’m talking about? Well, I’ve done most of the shit you’re doing right now. I smoked for 20 years; for several years I thought that pot was the fifth food group; I was a criminal. I did shit that I won’t talk about here, because your grandma still doesn’t know. I did shit that I won’t talk about here because I might still get into trouble with the law. I know what I’m talking about, because I did the shit you’re doing right now. I know because I saw people around me die – yeah, that’s right, die because they went down the path you’re starting to head down. I know others that went to jail; some of them will never come out. That’s right boy, some of these people I know are serving life sentences. So shut your hole, and open your mind boy, because none of these kids thought bad shit would happen to them either.

You need to quit the cigarettes boy, and you need to quit them now. You may think that you can quit any time you want, but try going more than a few hours without one. You’ll start getting nervous; you’ll start getting cranky; you’ll lose your concentration; before you know it, the only thing you’ll be able to think about is that next smoke. Then you’ll cave, come up with some rationalization about how you made it long enough to make your point… about how you were really stressed… about how you can quit any time you want. You’ll say all of this as you light up, freezing your ass off because you’re smoking outside during the winter, and coughing up chunks of dark brown shit from your lungs, because you’re inhaling cancer. How do I know? Kid, I smoked for 20 years. I’ve quit dozens of times, and I always caved, using the same rationalizations that I just gave you. It took 20 years before I finally quit for good. I'd like to save you that pain.

You need to quit the dope, boy, and you need to quit it now. I’m going to be straight with you, I don’t think that pot’s super bad. In fact, I think that both alcohol and tobacco are worse than pot. But I’ll also tell you this. You’re too young to be smoking the ganja. Your brain is still developing physically, and intellectually. If you start putting that shit into your brain now, your brain will suffer. Not only will your brain suffer, but you’ll live for the next high. You’ll get to the point where you only want to smoke up. You won’t want to go places, you won’t want to do things, and you won’t want to see people… unless they’re your tokin’ buddies. And oh yeah, you’ll want to eat. But you already know that shit, don’t you? Here’s the problem… if you spend all of your time getting high, you’re not learning things… you’re not growing as a person… you get to the point where you think that just getting high is enough, but letting your intellect go unused is uncool.

Get your ass back to school. And don’t just get your ass back to school, get your ass back to school and learn. I sure as hell don’t spend my tax dollars on school so you can skip. I spend my tax dollars on school so you can learn… so you can do a little better for yourself than I did for myself… than your dad did for himself… just like my dad did, and his dad, etc. Do you want to sling burgers for minimum wage and no benefits for the rest of your life? Do you want to live in a one-room shit-hole apartment, driving a vehicle that never runs right, collecting the welfare checks? Because that’s where you’re headed. Shit boy, you’ve got to go to college if you want a snowball’s chance at being anything other than a bum. And the way you’re going won’t get you into college.

I know you’ve already heard this shit before. But you’ve been getting lectures from people that don’t know like I know. They’re spouting shit they’ve read somewhere else. I lived the shit boy. I smoked tobacco for half of my life. Quitting was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. I smoked a lot of pot, and wasted a lot of my life. I had the dirtbag friends, all of whom ditched each other when the going got tough. These idiots aren’t your real friends. I, on the other hand, get it. I get the allure of where you’re headed. It’s a lie. I, despite how pissy I sound now, am telling you this because I truly love you, kid.

Now that I’ve said all of this, I want you to know that I’m not going to spend a bunch of time lecturing you from now on. I’ve said my peace. You can go get high now, or you can go smoke your cigarette, or you can go hang out with your dirtbag friends… the ones that’ll ditch you when the shit hits the fan. I’ll be waiting here, for when you want to talk… for when you want to just hang out… for when you’re ready to get your shit together. I’ll be here because I was there, where you are now. I’ll be here because I’m your uncle and I love you. Don’t make me wait too long, okay?