Hard to imagine a worse marital pairing than my parents. Talk about oil & water. How they even had a 2nd date baffles me to this day. I'll save the details for another post.
They finally split when I was 10, and somehow my ma reconnects with her high school bf, from waaaaay back in the day. He lives 4 hours north, the heart of Paul Bunyan land. Four teenage sons. On a giant multi-acre gated estate where Irish Wolfhounds were bred; they roamed free. Also roaming the grounds was a St. Barnard, a lab for hunting (duck hunting obsessed, he had an airboat like the everglades) and a tiny poodle who constantly tried to mount the St. Barnard. That would have been a youtube hit btw.
My first ever trip up there I was afraid to get out of the car as it appears I've arrived inside Jurassic Park. Irish Wolfhounds are the largest dog breed. The car is surrounded by them. Maybe only 2 or 3 but they're looking in the window right at me like I'm a snack. I'm 10 remember.
Anyhoots! Every other weekend my mom finds it wise to bring me up there, in the care of 4 teen boys from the country. So after school on Friday we'd drive up, and we would leave at, no joke, 3am Monday morning. No idea why 3am but that's what happened. Ok so Friday evening ma & bf head into the town of 500 people for steaks or whatever. The bf was a real deal alcoholic like in the movies. His hands shook constantly. I didn't know what that meant until years later. He actually was the county prosecutor, the actual D.A. / District Attorney. Ergo, untouchable. Also very well known in the county.
Anyhoots! Those two would motor into town, and within 15 minutes the driveway is filled with folding chairs and townie teens and a keg in the middle. Then the joints would be passed around. I'm 10, there's nothing for me to do, so I'm on the folding chairs with them. Taking hits on the joint and getting stoned out of my gourd. Yes, I'm 10. What are the townies doing? Laughing at me, because I had my eyes shut and was rolling my head around up & down then side to side. I would have laughed also. I would then wobble back into the house, attack the fridge with the munchies then go lie down in bed where I had vivid, intense bedspins for who knows how long before falling asleep. This went on for 2 years by the way.
Turns out, one the sons grew plants of what he called 'Columbian gold' in a clearing on the estate (it was many acres of forest). We visited the plants daily; they were my height, probably taller. He was growing magic mushrooms in his apartment when I visited him 10 years later. He got an electrical engineering degree and became a successful software programmer. Back then we would play 2 games over & over: Risk & chess. Never once, not even one time did I ever win. Much later in '96 we would play 'command & conquer red alert' over dialup modems(!) and wait for it, never once did I beat him.
Oh and, they put me on the back of a motorbike (once) and hit a forest trail briefly. Briefly as I freaked out and started bawling from sheer terror. I'm from the suburbs. They also let me go snowmobiling & jet skiing, I was better on those as I could drive them myself. To this day I don't like being a passenger in a car unless I rock solid trust the driver's skills & reflexes. Anyone can drive, and does. When you have a single second to react to being t-boned or whatnot, that's where my road focus is, constantly.
I don't recall if the brothers were giving me weed or selling it to me but I would bring some back to 'the cities' and get my friends high. At this point I'm 11 or 12. In hindsight, wtf? What was I doing? Or more to the point, why would they get a 10 year old stoned? It's bizarre to think about now. 10 year old druggie. Who knows what it did to my brain. I can still type though, apparently.