that time I was detained at the Candian border

So we met this guy on Craigslist.

Brianne had just moved back to the central coast and we needed to fill her room ASAP since Tricia and I couldn't afford the rent.  Craigslist is a pretty common tool up here in the Pacific Northwest so it's not as dangerous as it sounds, but boy did we not know what we were getting ourselves into when we met this fellow. Let's call him Karl. Karl is difficult to describe. On the one hand, he has saved 60 acres of old growth forest by spotting an endangered species of owl, but on the other hand, he used to whip his boxer-clad genitals with a belt while he watched you make dinner. So he was two halves of one very strange coin. And also really, really, ridiculously good-looking (or at least I thought so).

So here we are one month in to our living arrangement and for some reason we decide that we should all go to Canada for my 20th birthday. And, oh yes, we should also invite Karl's buddy Spike. (Unfortunately, Spike is not his real name.) So the four of us make a half-baked plan, grab our passports and our homemade juice and hop in the car. But WAIT! Not yet! Because apparently we first need to roll a joint so big that we have to use a piece of computer paper to hold it all together and draw a little American flag with crayons to tape on to the end. And smoking this right before leaving the U.S. will somehow cement our heritage as Americans before we cross the border? Yes, this is a fantastic and rational idea, so glad we came up with it.

The trip starts out normally enough; both Karl and Spike are making fun of me as I'm driving. First of all, I'm listening to Sublime and that's just so embarrassingly Californian so we have to change the music. Secondly, I've never been out of the country by myself so I don't know what to expect and I'm worried about getting through. This sends the boys (and Tricia) into riotous laughter. What did I think was going to happen at the border? That they were going to interrogate me? Karl grabs an empty snack bag with a bit of jam in the bottom and holds it up to my face. In the worst Canadian accent you can imagine he asks, "What this you got here, eh? Jelly? You jelly-baggin? You put a little jelly in a bag and you just carry that around like it's nothin'? Well we won't tolerate jelly-baggers here in this country. Lock her up!" And okay, I was laughing at this point, too.

But one of many things that we hadn't planned was where the star-spangled behemoth was to be smoked. I think the original plan was "we'll find somewhere" which manifested into smoking half of it at the Puget Sound state park but even between the three of them they couldn't manage to finish it. So later, about a mile before the border, they have me pull into the back lot of some abandoned warehouse-looking place. Now I'm already a worrier so I don't like this one bit. I'm pacing back and forth like a nervous chicken as I'm looking for any signs of trouble while my passengers are all but turning green from the amount of THC they are currently trying to suck into their faces. At some point, I snap and tell them that we are leaving now. Call it luck or intuition but just as we are leaving the complex, a cop car pulls in from the other direction, (in my mind because someone called him on us). And praise the sweet baby Jesus that this finally prompted my high-as-kite passengers to feel at least a moment's paranoia and ditch the rest of their joint (and its container) out of the moving car's window. Of course, this was after Spike very generously offered to "keister" it for us as we crossed the border- we politely declined.

So here we are in a car that I'm sure reeks of pot, three passengers stoned out of their ever-loving minds and me running at a thousand percent because I'm pretty sure I know just how fucked we are. And, oh yes, Tricia is the one who made all the travel arrangements. Cue us making it to the window of border patrol. I'll see if I can do this part justice.

Border Patrol: Hi, how ya doin there? Can I see your passports please?
Me: Yes, of course. Yes, thank you. Here they are; all the passports.
Border Patrol: Yeah, great thanks. Um can the young lady take off her shades please? And the fellow in the back? Huh, okay thanks. Where ya headed then?
Me: To Canada. I mean, Vancouver. We are visiting Vancouver tonight.
Border Patrol: Just for tonight, huh? What are you guys planning to do up there?
Me: Um, you know, enjoy Canada. It's my birthday so we just wanted to spend the night up there and just sort of enjoy the place.  Have some drinks, maybe.
Border Patrol: Coming up here to party?
Me: Yeah! I mean not like party party. It's for my birthday.
Border Patrol: Okay. You transporting anything in the car? You headed up there for a business deal or anything?
Me: No! No, nothing like that, we just want to hang out for the night.
Border Patrol: So where are you going to be staying then?
Me: Um, I don't.... Tricia? Where are we staying?
Tricia: (fumbles with papers in the glove box, then papers at her feet, then the glove box again) Um, a hostel. It's called umm... Hostel something? Vancouver.. um.....
Border Patrol: Okay, I'm gonna need you guys to pull around over to left and come on inside please.
Everyone in the car: shit.  

So I'm fucking panicking (obviously). In the holding area are us, a group of hippies that were transported there directly from Woodstock, and a nice-looking Middle Eastern family with two kids. They search the car, won't let us use the bathroom, and sweep us with drug dogs multiple times without success. This is when they pull out the old break-them-up-and-question-them-separately maneuver. I'm the last one to be interrogated and they call me up just as I'm in the middle of nervously tap-dancing across the floor. They pull me over to what looks like the checked-baggage counter at the airport and without preamble, the lady says:

"So, we talked to your friends. We know all about the drugs. Just tell us where they are and we can make all of this a lot easier for you".

Now, obviously, this is one of the oldest tricks in the books. The bad news is; I didn't actually know that at the time, so my immediate response was:

"Oh, thank god. Yeah, they are stoned out of their fucking minds right now but we don't actually have anything with us- they threw it out the window just before we got here. They were keeping it in an m&m minis case. You know, one of those tubes with m&ms in it but the candies are really small? But, yeah, it's gone now." It was only in retrospect that I realized the looks on their faces were incredulous astonishment.

With some reluctant grumbles they told us we couldn't get into Canada because Spike had a recent misdemeanor (unrelated) and, oh yeah, "Good luck getting back in to America" was thrown at us with a snotty grin. Those smug Canadian bastards.

Well the joke's on them because at the American border I had a gentleman with a gun strapped to his back look up my skirt as he easily processed me through and wished me a Happy Birthday to boot. I have to say it was the most comforting sexual harassment that I have experienced to date.

So after a few hours of sitting in traffic, we end up back in Seattle at some shitty Hostel in downtown called The Green Tortoise. It's $40/ night, smashed between a Seattle's Best Coffee and a Chinese restaurant (or it was at the time), with bunk beds and one bathroom shared per floor. After eating some dinner and playing Scrabble for a bit, we decide not to let this night go to waste so Karl, Spike, and Tricia head out to find treats to help me properly celebrate my birthday and turn this real lemon of a trip into a nice, cool glass of lemonade. When they return, they have a box of Coors Light, a bag of snacks, and a soft-core Vampire porn that was filmed entirely in Portland. (I was told this mini-adventure had it's own stories to tell but maybe we'll save that for another time.) After everyone got on their Jim-jams, we snuggled up with a big bag of popcorn, a beer a piece, and spent the night laughing at Karl as he made jokes about the movie's horrendous story line and complained about the complete lack of penises in this type of film.

Don't get me wrong, this was one of the most terrifying days of my life, but on the other hand it was also one of the most ridiculously fun. And although Karl was a really, really strange guy- I'm still completely glad I met him. And, oh yeah, I did end up having a great birthday after all.