Psst.

Wanna get high?

My new novel Weed Wine Magic will light your fire.

So will real weed wine.

I can’t wait to see the movie.

One night in late October my editor Stephanie to whom I am married and I settled into our cliffside room at the Inn at the Cove in Pismo Beach overlooking the Pacific Ocean, each holding half a glass of what California Central Coast winemaking guru Bob Lindquist calls his 2023 Grenache Rosé “Especial.” What makes Bob’s “Especial” wine particularly special is the hand-planted, hand-picked cannabis infused into the wine.

“We provide the juice and a friend provides the bud and makes the wine in his temperature controlled garage,” Bob said. “The 2023 weed wine is … from organic grapes and organic bud.”

“So clean and pure!” sayeth the weed wine guru.

“If the Feds legalize cannabis, then someday we might be able to make it legally and actually sell some,” Bob said with a glow in his voice as vivid as a black light “Keep on Trucking” poster.

Cannabis-infused wine is illegal to sell anywhere in the United States. Whenever you see weed wine for sale it’s not weed wine at all. The product is alcohol-free THC and CBD-infused grape juice. In California, though, state law permits people to make bona fide weed wine for their own personal use and to share with friends.

Since weed is still illegal where I live in Pennsylvania and I have abstained from all illegal drugs for more than 40 years, standing in the parking lot when Bob gifted me with two bottles of weed wine in a boutique brown paper bag I felt like singing back-up with the Eagles on “Desperado” or auditioning as Don Johnson’s co-star in a new “Miami Vice” movie. But Bob’s bounty registered on the Hoocha Weed Scale as 100-percent-high-CBD-low-THC-legal, the sacred consequence of organic farming philosophy that respects the planet, the cosmos and nature in general.

My high wasn’t so much a mental experience but a physically-centered and subtle liberation of spirit. Honed, not stoned, like a polished piece of green Big Sur jade that glistens in moonbeams. We finished the bottle the next night with similar peace of mind. Stephanie sensed lavender in a fresh bouquet of violets. Weird as it might sound, I caught a hint of crisp celery just cut from a Santa Maria field.

“Not real psychoactive,” said Bob.

“That’s OK,” I said, “I’m psychoactive enough as it is.”

Still, the weed wine offered a simple natural sacrament from which adherents can take an easy climb up the stairway to heaven. I imagine a greater THC concentration will take you higher, like Sly Stone sang at Woodstock, but Bob’s Buzzy Brand produced plant-based enlightenment that enraptured my endorphins and delighted my dopamine.

Before we flew home we took our second bottled pot potion to Mama Osa, our friend and inspiration for one of the Weed Wine Magic characters who lives in Halcyon, a cooperative Central Coast community based on theosophical philosophy and universal principles of goodness. Halcyon was hip long before the hippies. Mama Osa promised to keep our weed wine cool until we return next year.

We also expect to make the scene when Hollywood films the movie.

Weed Wine Magic is a unique story unlike any far-out flick moviemakers have produced in recent years. When I think about my book I think about writers Ken Kesey, Richard Brautigan and Hunter Thompson. When I think about a movie I think about easy-riding Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper, director Quentin Tarantino and Mexican director/actor Diego Luna.

My 2024 West Coast launch and readings from Blood Red Syrah, A Gruesome California Wine Country Thriller and the sequel Weed Wine Magic, A Freaky California Cannabis Country Chiller at Bob’s Arroyo Grande tasting room could not have gone better. Some of my best friends on the Central Coast showed up to raise a glass and cheer. Wine club members laughed at all the right times, asked smart questions and enjoyed drinking Bob and Louisa Lindquist’s fine family wines that once motivated editors at a prestigious magazine to name Bob one of the 50 best winemakers in the world.

We all agree a movie based on my novels would blast off.

We open with a drone shot of the contemporary raw western edge of America, rocky cliffs hovering over a wide expanse of deep blue sea. I hear psychedelic music, bongos and surf guitar. I see bountiful Hoocha Weed growing tall in tan sand mountains, the most potent cannabis on the planet. Mexican mysticism fills our souls.

Cheech and Chong might even ask for walk-on roles.

Lights.

Camera.

Action.

My big screen psychedelic dream is why I’m sending queries to film industry executives. If Hollywood producers are willing to tune in and turn on to Weed Wine Magic we’ll get the green light, step on the gas and take the ride. American moviegoers are long overdue for better high times. Truly creative people can take only so many superheroes. The diverse characters in my books reflect deeply held power of the people, untapped consciousness and wisdom daring producers can bring to a boil like homemade weed wine aged in the ancient Oceano dunes.

A young, bold audience is ready to take our trip through the open doors of perception, a journey to the center of their minds as well as the minds of my protagonists and antagonists both human and otherwise. The Weed Wine Magic movie will energize us to escape our craven new world, exchanging chaos for peace and love.

Paz y amor will prevail in our new age of Aquarius. Like the song says, “peace will guide our planets” and “love will steer the stars.”

See you at the premier.