Just recently, I went to my high school reunion and met up with a 
few of my old friends to find out that they are all very much in 
the same groups as they were back then. I had not seen any of 
them since high school because I had to move back east to go to 
NYU but they had all stayed in Los Angeles and kept in touch.

While they all had different jobs – pharmacist, radiologist, 
three pre-school teachers and a web hosting technician – they all 
met at least once a week, generally on Mondays to watch films.

So they invited me to one of these gatherings and thinking of it 
as an extension of the high school reunion, I went. As expected, 
I walked in to find the familiar faces sitting around a nice 
table with appetizers and drinks aplenty.

After settling down and saying the usual "hi’s and how are you’s" 
they asked me to choose which film we would watch that night, by 
directing me toward the movie library in the corner.
 
I snapped my fingers to show off my expert taste in cinema, 
ranging from Gone with the Wind to Machiavelli Hangman, and I
approached the collection that looked so impressive and promising
from a distance. As I stood a foot away, glaring over the 
different titles, I noticed an interesting and strange taste. 
There were films like Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, the whole 
Harry Potter movies, Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings and the 
Star Wars movies including a copy of the latest – Revenge of 
the Sith.
 
The crowd didn’t strike me as a dorky crowd even though all these 
films were definitely in the dorky category. I was just surprised 
not to find the complete 100 seasons of Star Trek. Right when I 
simply closed my eyes and just picked a film, I noticed that they 
had all pulled out their pipes and had started smoking marijuana. 

It was all starting to make sense. I threw another glance at the 
movie collection and realized that this was not a dork collection 
but a pothead collection. 

We sat there and smoked out and I watched Lord of the Rings as if 
it was a completely different movie. It wasn’t about the plot or 
the dialogue anymore but entering a zone that was out of the 
world.

The next day, I had such a big headache that I couldn’t go back 
to work. I called my friend and asked him about it and he told me 
how there was a whole sub-world of these pothead-film collectors 
and these gatherings happened more often than I knew.

I was completely stunned by this revelation. I didn’t go back to 
those gatherings again, but ever since, I look at every movie and 
wonder if it would belong on that pot-head movie shelf. 

Coco M. Johnson is a movie reviewer. Coco likes 
intelligent films like the upcoming movie release 
called, Machiavelli Hangman. 
http://www.hangmanmovie.com