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Introduction to Drug Culture at a Led Zeppelin Show
Wide-eyed and Ready
I was 13 or 14 when I went to see Led Zeppelin at Three Rivers Stadium in Pittsburgh. It was a big stadium, used for Pittsburgh’s NFL and MLB teams.
We got there early and sat fairly high up.
I was with my friend Ed and the older, hip, long-haired soccer-playing teenager that Ed’s family had staying with them from Ecuador on an educational program, Pablo.
His English was not strong, so I didn’t know him well, but being as he lived at my close friend’s house, which was nearby, we crossed paths a lot.
It turned out that he knew all about weed.
We hadn’t talked about getting high, and although I had one toke when I was 12, I was really a virgin to the drug scene. I didn’t know it, but I was ready to jump in.
The sound system played a bunch of Beatles songs before the show started. I remember thinking that this was as cool as it gets, with The Beatles warming us up for the live show, the great Led Zeppelin.
Pablo was scanning the crowd around us. After a little while, he got up and went away.
Before too long, he was back. He sat down, pulled out a bag of weed that he’d just scored, and some papers. I watched in amazement at…
