Chronic[les]: AZ Prop 205

 

So, Arizonans get a chance to vote on legalized recreational marijuana... again. It's come up before and failed by respectable margins. This year may be watershed. Public opinion has shifted heavily in the last few years on medical marijuana use, and we're faced with the most comical presidential tickets since the script of Idiocracy got the green light. People are tired of shitty options with shittier justifications.

I just scanned past CNN for the headlines (for which my ultra-Republican boss calls me a "commie") and saw a graphic that indicates early voting returns in Arizona are favoring the Libertarian candidate, Gary Johnson. That. Is. Epic. Anyone remotely familiar with Arizona knows that this is just a Republican state. Not that it matters much, since our meager few electoral votes don't amount to a fart in the wind of democracy. Be that as it may, we still vote red. Always have, always... well...

The implication that such a conservative state is willing to shift on something like the presidential candidate, to the untested Libertarian no less, is very favorable to the marijuana lobby. Libertarians, as you may know, generally object to the government telling them what they can and cannot do. As previous entries have intimated, as much as explicitly stated, the nature of marijuana puts it on par with regulating a tomato. There is no scientific purposed to keeping it a Schedule 1 drug.

Like most legislative decisions, this continued status is a result of misinformation and [likely] corporate interests. The emergence of a rumor in 2014 that Phillip Morris was introducing Marlboro M marijuana cigarettes was at the very least plausible, given that special interest groups have being buying representation from Capitol Hill for as long as there have been elected officials. There's nothing partisan about it. The 1% occupy both sides of the aisle, after all, but this is a fabricated story.

Even so, there is the fact that US law disallows placing any naturally occurring substance under patent. There is only one way to capitalize on a substance that cannot be trademarked. Make it illegal to posses, distribute, or transport; issue huge fines for non-compliance.

Does this sound conspiratorial? A little. Is it true? Probably more than anyone really wants to admit. Colorado and Oregon both experienced an interesting set of interrelated phenomena following the legalization of recreational marijuana. The first was pot-tourism. People flocked into the state(s) to get legal weed at licensed dispensaries. The second was a reinforcement of the black market, as locals with connections didn't want to pay the exceptional taxes associated with product purchased through dispensaries. The third, and most telling, was a massive decrease in misdemeanor crimes (mostly related to possession) and a drastic increase in felonies.

Wait, increased crime? Well, really a redistribution based on the nature and degree of the crimes being committed. Dispensaries may be legal at the state level, but they are still subject to federal banking laws which make banking monies made on the drug trade illegal. All transactions for weed, [state] legal or not, have to be in cash. Dispensaries are subject to more armed robberies now than any other retail business.

Curious, don't you think, that the often-hyped increased crime that was expected to accompany legal weed is actually a result of violent crime tangential to the weed sales? No one started crashing cars into school loading zones. Cheeto theft didn't suddenly explode. There weren't bloody dance-offs breaking out in shopping malls. No crime, other than that related to the incapacity to securely perform the business of selling weed, increased.

Prop. 205 covers a lot of legal hurdles that would keep Arizonans out of jail for possession, but I believe that additional steps need to be taken to keep dispensaries safe. That seems to be dependent entirely on the the Federal government though. Simple ideas like state exchanges similar to the child support system would allow Arizona to collect secure transactions from consumers and then distribute funds to retailers, and at the same time collect user fees in the form of taxes to be used for the State. However, to whatever extent those are intertwined with the Fed, everyone still remains exposed.

The States are starting to exercise their authority, reflective of the will of the People. Lawmakers aren't going to be able to deny the public voice much longer. Arizona previously passed ballots that allowed medical marijuana use, first in 1996, then again in 1998. Both of those measures, however, were inadequately worded to protect patients from prosecution. Rather than amending the statutes, the state simply overturned them and waited until later measures received enough support to qualify them for the ballot. In effect, the AZ legislature back-doored the public in what I would call a governmental repurposing of the term "changing lanes without signaling."

It wasn't until Prop. 203 passed in 2010 that medical and compassionate care use came to be. To some degree or another, the voting pubic is of a majority opinion that marijuana should be legal. With elections in just two weeks, I'm hopeful that Arizona joins the ranks of more enlightened society.

We've demonized weed for decades without cause. It's been indoctrinated into entire generations without the benefit of critical examination. It's legal use has been pulled out from under the public by poorly written language. We've been cheated, lied to, and blinded from reality.

The world has a long and intimate romance with pseudoscience and medical quackery. Hopefully, the tide is turning.

Chronic[les]: Objectivity on Opioids

Please know that I do not come into this post with preconceived notions. There is no position to defend or agenda to advance. I'm just a guy with piqued curiosity and access to Google. So here we go.

I've recently heard repeated used of the phrase "opioid crisis". I didn't think much of it at first because, hell, people have been popping pills for as long as I've been aware of the concept of drug abuse. It has always been another behavior in a series of behaviors that Nancy Reagan campaigned against in the 80's. Nothing noteworthy about it. What could possibly have elevated this to the level of 'crisis'?

I have almost no context for it. I once had a prescription for Vicodin following oral surgery. I took it on a schedule recommended by the doctor. To the best of my recollection, the pain didn't actually lessen, so I really didn't see the point in taking it. I was, however, dutiful about it. Every six hours, I downed a pill of such size that my jaws seared in protest. After the sixth dose, I felt queasy and soon vomited. For all the up I've thrown in my life, I've never had to do it through clenched teeth. I felt like a bilious lawn sprinkler.

Opioids (in the form of Vicodin, anyway) did not agree with me. I never saw the appeal, either recreationally, or medically. I never felt better, and I've rarely felt worse. That leaves me hard pressed to understand why their use could even be called a crisis, as my own experience was so unpleasant. Who would want to subject themselves to such a reaction?

While my response was not at all unique, I appear to be in an insignificant minority of people who have not two shits to give about an opium high. Dr. Nora Volkow presented to the US Senate Caucus on International Narcotics Control that some 2.1 million Americans, however, had some variety of opioid dependence. Another 467,000 were believed to be addicted to heroin. The link between prescription abuse and heroin addiction is noted to have been increasing.

In 2000, her report states, opioid prescriptions tallied 126 million for the year. By 2010, that number had risen to 210 million. Within the same time frame (2004-2008), emergency room visits from non-prescribed opiate overdoses rose from 144,600 to 305,900. Fatalities from overdoses also tripled.

Stats are a bitch, aren't they?

Let's go beyond stats. What's the science of it? First, let's be clear that even the word "opioid" is not exactly indicative of its origin. Opiates (not to be confused with opioids) are derivative from the opium poppy and include morphine and heroin. Opioids are chemical compounds that react to the opiate receptors in our brains. They are easily synthesized, effective at pain management, and nearly identical with respect to their addictive properties. Even anti-withdrawal compounds like methadone, which is used to help heroin users, are commonly abused.

Addiction is so common because opioids, in the long term, inhibit the body's ability to to produce its own opioid chemicals like endorphins and encephalins. Withdrawal symptoms accompany this absence of opioids and hilarity ensues.

Great... Useful information, right? Actually, it's troubling. Dr. Volkow's report draws an interesting correlation. Doctors are getting wise and becoming reluctant to hand out scrips for opioids. 2013 was the first down-tick in prescription issuance in twenty years, which should ostensibly be a good thing. Arizona even enacted in 2017 limits on prescription of opioid pain-relievers to a five-day supply.  However, where pill-poppin' gets more difficult, heroin makes an effective and economical substitute. Heroin dosing is difficult to regulate, as is the quality of the product. But what choice is there? The medical community unwittingly created  a generation of junkies and now has to figure out a way to get them clean.

Research is being conducted into technologies that will reduce addictive effects of opioids. One of the more promising is one that would allow opioids to interact with cannabinoid receptors in the brain. These receptors work perfectly well with marijuana, as the name implies. Marijuana, as previously posted, is non-toxic, non-addictive, carries lower risk of tolerance, and concurrently treats a number of other illnesses.

The state of Massachusetts has been treating opioid dependency with medical marijuana, publishing one of the first public reports just in October, 2015. While it is far from being a clinical slam-dunk, it's another bit of information that points to the potential for medical marijuana use.

This is an issue that has taken on personal importance for me and I intend to drill down to the irrefutable facts. The world is not as complicated as bureaucracy makes it. Natural compounds are available for our treatment and improved health. Ignorance is a poor excuse to create crises such as this one. It's an even poorer excuse for resolving it with the traditionally painful and health-negative protocols we use.

Interestingly, the existence of the opioid crisis is not really debated. There are no political divides on the issue. The Left and Right agree that it's an issue, which is exceedingly rare. It may be because of the equality with which it strikes at Americans. Every racial group, income level, geographic region, and background are affected by it.

In researching this topic, I really didn't find any source of information that refuted the existence of this crisis. One downplayed it as minor percentages, but seems to be ignorant of how many people may be dependent by focusing on how many die from use. That seems somehow insufficient to me.

I will continue to make this a topic of interest. It does, after all, have my curiosity. There can be no greater impetus for knowledge than wonder.

Chronic[les]: Suspension of Disbelief

I finally got to see the 1936 American propaganda film, Reefer Madness. For those that haven't seen it, it's a pseudo-biopic that claims to a retelling of actual events. It's corny. It's melodramatic. It's also wildly inaccurate.

The film portrays events surrounding the purported dangers of marijuana abuse. Centered on a couple of unfortunate youth who fall in with the wrong crowd, the rapid decline into madness is frightening, or rather would be if it had any basis in fact. Through the magic of scientific discovery, we now know the representation to be a complete farce. The US Government funded this film, which is shockingly prurient for the period, to induce hysterical support for a ban on marijuana.

The success of the anti-marijuana campaign that followed the release of the film was dependent entirely on the ignorance of the public, which was seemingly considerable. The year following its release, the 1937 Marihuana Tax Act was passed. Within that legislation, heavy restrictions on the sale and transport of the drug were in place, along with penalties for mishandling. From that point forward, weed was increasingly criminalized until the final complete ban instituted by President Nixon in the early 70's.

In my previous post on this topic, I pointed out that marijuana is non-toxic, non-carcinogenic, and non-addictive. One would be hard pressed then to identify just what the objection is. Having grown up as a child of the 80's, I sat through the DARE (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) presentations. I even knew our school's DARE officer. I learned to "just say no" like Nancy Reagan wanted. I also accepted, by way of indoctrination, that marijuana was a "gateway drug."

I recall in the 5th grade having our school counselor do a drug presentation. He asked one classmate after another if drugs were "bad." Without hesitation, they answered "yes." Mr. White continued to ask students until he came to one who said "no." It was then that he let us in on the little secret that no one really bothered to tell us about. The definition of what a drug was. It's remarkably simple, really.

A drug is a substance that is put into the body to change how the body works.

This is why Mr. White insisted on finding a student who said drugs weren't bad. They're not. At least not intrinsically. However, Reefer Madness was produced in such a way that demonized marijuana. The portrayal makes it clear that even minimal exposure robs one of their faculties, turning them into a lust driven lunatic bent on mayhem and murder.

Show me an article, publication, news story, or any other vetted source that tells such a tale. Truth is, they don't exist. Harry J. Anslinger, first Commissioner of the US Treasury Department's Federal Bureau of Narcotics, began lobbying heavily to criminalize marijuana following the repeal of Volstead Act (Prohibition), which died with the ratification of the 21st Amendment in 1933. Previously, he'd been quite neutral and disinterested in the use of marijuana. However, setting his sights on a new pariah, he launched a campaign to make weed illegal. He cited dozens, if not hundreds, of stories of murder or violence committed under the influence of marijuana. Most of them were simply falsely attributed to cannabis. Some were outright fabrications. The tactic was effective, however. He garnered enough support to put it before Congress, even convincing them of his lies, and helped get the 1937 Marihuana Tax Act passed.

Yes, I titled this entry "Suspension of Disbelief." The phrase normally refers to the ability of a film to convince you, at least while you're watching, that the events are real. In this case, I'm not referring to Reefer Madness. I'm most interested in the concerted efforts of US officials to ban something which presents no public health hazard and kills precisely zero people each year from disease related to consumption.

I cannot suspend my disbelief! I admit that deliberate ignorance is a pet peeve. In this case, the deliberate ignorance of scientific evidence, and the active limitation on establishing more scientific data, for the purposes of moral temperance... staggers me.

Logical conclusions are not hard to establish. Logically, our lawmakers are ignorant of scientific fact. Logically, the legislature has no interest in the impact that criminalization of marijuana has on non-violent offenders who end up in prison for extended stays. Logically, our elected officials are mired in decades-old propaganda with little respect for reality.

I will agree that these are incomplete conclusions and that other truths may exist. However, this theory explains the observation based on the available evidence.

Why is this topic becoming one of my favorites? Because it's so easy to pick on. The laundry list of fallacious reasoning, collusion, and public deception make it a poster child for malicious governance. The polls will be opening in a few weeks, and we will again have the opportunity to weigh in on our representation. Each passing year brings me a little bit more angst and disbelief in the people who waste taxpayer dollars while claiming to be public servants.

My next entry will focus on the current "opioid crisis." Juxtaposed against the Federal ban on medical marijuana, you may be just as confused as I am.

Chronic[les]: Blunt Language and Joint Efforts

Author's Note: The following is not meant to examine the morality of cannabis use. It is meant to highlight the disparity between science and law, and the resulting struggle between what is logical and what is lawful. Whatever your feelings are on marijuana use, understand that the laws of the United States are purposefully ignorant.

The Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) defines Schedule I drugs as "substances, or chemicals... with no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse." Apropos, cannabis is labeled as such a drug, wherein it carries stiff penalties for possession, use, distribution, and trafficking. It rubs shoulders, in fact, with the likes of heroin, LSD, Ecstasy, Quaalude, and peyote (which is approved only for certain religious rites of native tribes).

All of this begs a single, relevant question. Who says what "accepted medical use" is?

Apparently, that responsibility falls firmly on the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Let's be clear, if it isn't already; the FDA is an Executive agency within the US Government. As an agency, they work closely with the DEA to regulate medical marijuana research.

Based on what we already know, let's establish a few things. Firstly, marijuana is a narcotic by order of the DEA. Secondly, a narcotic is a drug that dulls senses, relieves pain, or induces sleep (marijuana fits this description). Thirdly, narcotics in excessive doses can cause stupor, coma, or convulsions.

The first point is not one that is up for contention. That's a cold, hard fact. Point two really isn't up for contention either. Marijuana has been proven effective in pain management, cancer treatment, and numerous other neurological disorders. The third point, however, is where marijuana fails to fit the implied description.

I really hate to come at this entry with dictionary in hand, but it's important to know what words mean before we use them, or acquiesce to their incorrect use. It has a direct and measurable impact on the interpretation of the standards being applied. So, here we go....

Stupor is generally defined as "a condition of greatly dulled or completely suspended sense or sensibility" or "mental torpor." More elaborate descriptions explain the absence of response to all but the most base stimuli, such as pain, shock, bright light, or loud noise. There has never been a recorded case of a person smoking themselves unconscious. Asleep? Certainly. But never unresponsive.

Coma is an extended state of unconsciousness, lasting days, or even years. In this state, even extreme stimuli mentioned above are ineffective. Given that marijuana is not known to induce stupor, it's proven completely incapable of inducing coma.

That brings us to convulsions. Typically manifesting as rapid, uncontrolled muscle movements, loss of speech, and occasionally soiling oneself, it should be noted that cannabinoids have been successfully used in treating and preventing these symptoms. Epilepsy has been effectively treated by canabidiol (CBD), a chemical found only in marijuana.

Given that the three major, negative narcotic effects cannot be attributed or associated with marijuana, it seems unfair at this point to lump it in with known dangerous drugs. But is that enough to rest on? Hardly.

The DEA also stipulates that Schedule 1 drugs have a "high potential for abuse." This clause is not defined, nor is clarification given. However, we can infer what is meant by comparing it to Schedule 2 drugs, which also have "a high potential for abuse, with use potentially leading to severe psychological or physical dependence." So there you have it. Schedule 1 drugs like marijuana carry a high risk of psychological or physical dependence. But, does it?

Cannabis Use Disorder is a condition in which a cannabis user experiences some degree of dependence. Dependence is vastly different from addiction, but is often used as a proxy in surveys studying the possibility of cannabis addiction, so the proof of addiction is highly questionable. Around 9% of marijuana users (dependent on their age at the time habitual use begins) develop some degree of dependency. Physical dependence has not been identified (see my entry Chronc[les]: But not for the Gander for a description of the condition HYPERALGESIA associated with opioid abuse).

By way of comparison, 15% of alcohol users, 23% of heroin users, and 32% of tobacco users develop dependency. According to an article published by the New York Times, of heavy marijuana users who attempt to quit "...some get withdrawal symptoms such as irritability, sleeping difficulties and anxiety that are usually described as relatively mild." The painful, and sometimes life-threatening, ordeal of getting off of other drugs would place marijuana withdrawal somewhere in the range of 'mild hangover'.

That really only leaves one question. How dangerous is it to overdose on marijuana? Here's the thing... depending on how you define an overdose, it's effectively impossible to do. The amount of marijuana that it takes to kill a user is estimated to be 40,000 times greater than what it takes to get a user stoned. It must be estimated because the actual number hasn't been found yet. Though one could make the argument that an overdose is characterized by paranoia, vomiting, tremors, and other physiological symptoms that pass within 20-30 minutes.

The state of Oregon (oregon.gov) has available through their website a report issued by the Institute for Cannabis Therapeutics which states "...enormous doses of Delta 9 THC, All THC and concentrated marijuana extract ingested by mouth were unable to produce death or organ pathology in large mammals..." Smaller animals, like mice, did die. However, as the article points out, this dose would be equivalent to an average person (154lbs) eating 46lbs of marijuana. That's a lot of hooch. It should be noted, you can die by alcohol poisoning with as little as five times the intoxicating dose.

With all of this in mind, there's one issue that needs to be cleared up. By whose estimation is marijuana as dangerous as heroin or cocaine? By whose estimation is there no accepted medical use? As we established earlier, the DEA and FDA. But who are they? They're law makers and enforcers. The DEA and FDA are not lead by doctors, and the doctors that they do employ are tasked with ensuring compliance, not providing medical advice. The leaders are not medical professionals with extensive lab or research experience. Yet they hold all the keys and guard all the locks. They are the worst possible entities to have the responsibility of making medical recommendations.

There isn't a single scrap of evidence that marijuana is addictive, toxic, or carcinogenic. There are mountains of evidence that it has medical value. Habitual users only suffer minor psychological withdrawal symptoms. Occasional users experience no adverse side effects. Yet we jail people for inordinate periods of time for possession of a non-lethal, non-addictive, non-toxic plant. Because why? Because bureaucrats said so.

I'm neutral over the notion of recreational marijuana use. I have no more interest in whether people smoke out or drink. Although, alcohol intoxication has the tendency to make you think you can do anything, including drive, whereas marijuana intoxication makes you want to sit on the couch. In that respect, I'd rather people toked out than slam tequila.

I'm a considerable advocate for the use of medical marijuana. I've seen its effects first hand, and the more I learn about its advantages and safety of use, the more convinced I am in the failure of our government on yet another level. This is an under-investigated issue with myopic officials at the helm. There is no scientific reason to classify marijuana as it is.

Your elected officials, their representatives, appointees, and assignees say otherwise. Ignorance speaks. Loudly. Those in power are listening.

Milton the Furry Turtle

This is a departure from my regular thinking-man's existential blog. This is just a story that I wanted to write just for the kiddos out there. For the people with kids. For the kids who are wondering who they want to be. For the kids wondering who they are...

Milton the Furry Turtle

Copyright 3/9/2016

Milton was a turtle. As turtles go, he wasn’t all that extraordinary. He had a shell and a tail, scaly skin, and all of the other things that you would think of when you thought of a turtle. But what you couldn’t see, deep in his heart, was a dream.

The dream was the same one he’d had from the moment he hatched and stepped foot into the world. No, it wasn’t to be fast. That would be silly! Who has ever heard of a fast turtle? It wasn’t to be tall. Why, that’s just as absurd.

No. Milton had a dream that was bigger than all of those things! In fact it was bigger than all of the dreams any other animals had ever had if you mashed them all together.

Milton wanted fur.

Every day, Milton would shuffle down to the pond and gaze at himself in the water. He sometimes had to think very hard about how he thought he should look. Without fail, though, he would see himself as he truly wanted to be.

He imagined all varieties of fur. He saw himself with the long mane of the horse, or the shaggy coat of the coyote. Sometimes it was the finer fur of the squirrel, or even the coarse hairs of the skunk with their racing stripes.

And he was beautiful! At least to himself he was. To the other animals, he simply looked as an ordinary turtle should look.

One day, as he stood by the pond enjoying the image of his magnificent mane, his friend Waldorf the Chipmunk happened by.

“Mornin’ Milt,” Waldorf chittered.

“Heya, Wally,” Milton replied.

“Whatcha doin’,” Waldorf asked.

“Just lookin’ at me,” he replied.

“Why?”

“Just tryin’ to see what’s missin’,” Milton explained. “Ever feel like you’re missin’ somthin’?”

“Acorns, mostly. That's what my mama says,” Waldorf shrugged. “She always says, ‘Waldorf, you’re a few acorns short of an oak tree.’ But I didn't know I was missin’ any acorns.”

“I don’t think that’s what she means, Wally,” Milton smiled.

“Well, whadya mean, Milt? What are you missing?”

“Fur.”

Waldorf rolled in the dirt clutching at his belly and laughing. Milton’s heart sank. “You can’t have fur, silly! Everyone knows that turtles don’t have fur!” Waldorf exclaimed between giggles.

“Just because you’ve never seen one doesn’t mean that I can’t! I can be anything I want, and I want to be furry!” Milton said with every ounce of courage he could muster.

“Oh, Milt. I’ve never seen a duck hoot like the owl either, and I know I never will. It’s just the way it is.” Waldorf tried to sound comforting, but it wasn’t helping Milton. “Ducks don’t hoot, chipmunks don’t lay eggs, and turtles don’t have fur, my friend.”

Waldorf rubbed Milton's shell and hopped off into the tall grass. Milton knew that Waldorf was right, of course. No turtle in the history of turtles had ever had fur. He also knew that in his heart, he was supposed to be the first.

Milton thought of one last place to go. His mama... She always knew just how to fix everything.

When he got to her home, she put a plate of cookies in front of him, just as she always did when she was sad. "What has my baby boy so inside out?" she asked.

"Mama, I don't know how to say this and I don't want you to be disappointed," Milton started. 

"Milton," Mama said, "you could never disappoint me."

"I'm supposed to be furry..." Milton looked at her from the corner of his eye, trying to see her reaction. Mama just pursed her lips and sat down next to him.

"Son, you know there's never been a furry turtle in these woods, right?" Mama asked.

"Yes'm," he replied.

"You know that you were not hatched with that future in mind, right?" she asked.

"Yes'm. Are you disappointed?" Milton wondered.

"Not in you my dear. Not in you," Mama assured. Milton finally turned his head to see his mother's worried face. "I'm disappointed that you will have a difficult road ahead of you. I'm disappointed that this unexpected path in front of you will have struggles that will be yours alone to overcome. No parent wants that for their child."

"What will I do, Mama?" Milton asked.

"Your best, my love. You will do your best." Mama gave him another cookie and kissed him on the head.

“I gotta go, Mama,” Milton said, and started the long walk back to his burrow to think. It was a cozy little burrow dug into the side of a hill under an old log that was covered in moss. It was also where he got his best ideas.

All day and all night, Milton sat in his burrow and pondered his problem. How does a turtle get fur? Of course, he had many ideas, but none of them seemed to work.

He tried pushing hair out of his body from the inside. He pushed with all his might, but only got strange noises coming from his tail.

He tried to walk through the brambles hoping the coyote fur stuck to them would in turn stick to him, but it simply didn’t work. In fact, the brambles slipped over his shell as if he weren’t even there.

He tried borrowing fur from the dens of the field mice, though they said he was crazy. Again, the fur slid off his shell without so much as a hit of taking root.

He thought rolling in mud may help the fur stick, but the only thing that got stuck was him. He lay there a good long time before Waldorf found him and flipped him over.

Word had begun to spread in the woods about what Milton meant to do, and time after time, animals would stop to chuckle and point at the crazy little turtle that wanted fur. Milton thought very long and very hard and soon decided to give up. The other animals were right, after all. Turtles weren’t supposed to have fur.

So Milton went back to his burrow and was very sad. Even the sky had turned sad. As the rain began to fall and thunder crash, Milton took comfort in thinking the sky was as sad as he.

All night it rained, pouring great gouts of water into the woods. Though Milton’s burrow was in the side of a hill and under his log, the ground still became muddy and soft.

Even so, Milton was able to fall asleep. All night the thunder crashed and the rain poured down. Milton’s dreams were frightful. He worried that he may never get his fur, no matter how hard he wished or knew it was meant to be.

Morning finally came and the sun peeked through the clouds. Milton crawled out of his burrow under the mossy log. He stretched his little turtle legs and was again determined to figure out a way to get his fur. As he basked in the warmth of the sun for a moment, he felt a cold, wet plop on the back of his shell. He turned his head to look and saw that the moss growing on his log had slid off onto his back in a thick blanket of green.

“Hmmph,” he groused to himself. “Now I’m covered in moss!”

He tried to shake his shell to remove it, but the sun quickly dried the roots of the moss to his shell. He tried to scrape it off on the underside of the log, but he just couldn’t reach. Frustrated and at his wit’s end, he flopped down in a puddle to pout.

“Great!” Milton said. “Not only do I have no fur, but now I’m covered in moss!”

It was then that Waldorf came along.

“Hiya, Milt!” he chirped.

“Hey, Wally”, Milton sighed.

“What’s wrong, Milt?” Waldorf said with concern.

“As you might have noticed, I still have no fur and I’m now covered in moss”, Milton pointed out.

Waldorf looked over Milton’s shell and saw that the moss had in fact become stuck on his shell. But it was still healthy and green. And on top of that, it had a single daffodil growing from the middle.

“Ya know, Milt, the moss kinda looks like fur!” Waldorf said in surprise.

“It does?” Milton exlaimed.

“Yeah,” Waldorf said, “green, but still furry! And I can promise you that no other animal in the woods has fur like this! Heck, you’re even growing a flower!”

Milton looked again and he finally saw it! It did look like fur! He turned this way and that way letting the dew catch the sunlight. His fur was healthy and bright, reflecting the light so beautifully that you could even see rainbows in the water droplets.

Milton was so proud that he strutted through the woods as best a turtle can. The other animals called out to him “Hey Milton, nice ’fur’!”, trying to make a joke of it. But he would just reply, “I bet you can’t grow fur like mine!” And he was right.

His fur was unique, unlike any other animal in the forest. It took time for them to see Milton as he saw himself, but soon enough they recognized him as the ‘furry’ turtle. Milton had always known what he was supposed to be, and though it wasn’t what others expected when he told them who he was, he believed in himself long enough that others finally saw him as the beautiful Milton he had always been.

Milton had finally found himself. Though it was hidden behind the turtle he had always been, and looked nothing like what the other animals thought it should look like, he had at last convinced everyone that he was the furriest turtle they would ever see and just as furry as he had ever hoped to be.

The end.