Reply To: Who were the “victims” of my father’s patch back in the 1990s?
That wasn’t my mom I was talking about in the story, that was my dad’s first wife (the mother of my three older brothers). Her and my dad were together from high school and they divorced in 1998 shortly after my dad got out of jail. Fact is that my dad took all the heat legally and served the time, and she got let off with no record; the school fired her to make a statement, NOT because the kids were in legit danger, she’s a sweet lady, I’ve met her.
My mom started dating my dad shortly AFTER he got out of jail and for the first few years he was still smoking meth, yes (he claims to have smoked it in at least the early 90s, but IDK any stories about it prior to this), and when my mom moved to another island in 2000, he moved with her, but then used to fly back home every 2 weeks to go smoke ice, and she told him they’d be through if he did that again either shortly before or after I was born in June 2002. So he got a carpentry job (he’s always been a really good carpenter and mechanic), and by the time I was 4, in 2006, he qualified to be a journeyman. Far cry from who he was in the late 1990s and early 2000s.
But then shortly after we moved back to Molokai in 2008, he lost his job in 2009 after the real estate crash and couldn’t find any meaningful jobs on-island for over 2 years (other than a construction project here and there). So my mom eventually told him in 2011 that he might as well grow weed again like he did with his first wife if he can’t find a job, so he took her literally and started growing an 800-plant patch in the forest behind our yard going up the mountain, worth about $1.6 million at the time (800 plants x 1 lb per plant x $2,000 per lb). At the same time he started growing this new patch is when he relapsed on his ice addiction however, which I’ve touched upon here before. Long story short, my mom told my dad he wouldn’t be able to see me anymore if he didn’t go to rehab, so he left Molokai in February 2012 and didn’t return until April 2021, and I saw him 6 times during that interval (all off-island).
And on Molokai, weed is SUPER cheap right now, practically free. “Killa” ounces are like $120-$150, good ounces are about $100, “okay” ounces are about $80, and then you can get a cheap oz of some low, probably 5-10% garbage for as little as $40 or $50 if you know the right grower. I know multiple friends and family members I can score free bud from (but I still buy when I can cause I don’t wanna bum people all the time). I hear through the grapevine about guys giving out pounds (not ounces, pounds) for $300 these days. When my dad had his patch in the 90s, he was charging $6,000 per pound, and then his 2011 revival patch was worth about $2,000 per pound. Now an excellent pound can get you $1,000, but they can go as low as $300, like I said.
It’s because back then they had green harvest and the police used to patrol the islands in helicopters, executing weed farm raids very aggressively. Now everyone’s using the medical card to grow their legal limit and sell it on the black market, so now instead of going to the expert growers, anybody and their grandma can be a grower. And since there’s med cards now, the cops don’t really pay as much attention or bust people unless they get ratted out (which does still happen), so less people are afraid to do so, driving the supply up even further. Great time to be a stoner here.
