We got the minister’s wife stoned on Superbowl Sunday

We didn’t intentionally get the minister’s wife stoned, it just happened one Superbowl Sunday a couple years back, that last Superbowl before my dad died.

All he wanted was a party surrounded by food and friends, so we filled his house with wings and love, so he could enjoy what everyone knew would be the last party.

It should have been sad, except it wasn’t. In fact, we laughed and laughed and I don’t know who was playing whom, but I know there was plenty of Velveeta, pizza, wings, and boneless spareribs from the greasy Chinese place in town.

“Mrs. Peachtree is wasted,” my sister confided eyeballing the minister’s wife propped up in an oversized chair, nodding off with jerky movements like a bobble head.

“Probably just tired, she’s 80 you know,” I said. “She doesn’t drink.”

“She does tonight,” sister said, as Mrs. Peachtree lurches out of the chair, spins like a line dancer, and bobs down the hall toward the bathroom, bouncing off each side of the hallway like a bumper car.

Worried she had a stroke, I quickly followed her down the hall. “Mrs. Peachtree, you okay? Everything okay?”

She looked at me, through my heathen soul, trying desperately to focus then grabbed my shirt and said:

“Why, Kathy, I do not believe I am. Not okay at all, feeling a little fuzzy I am. A bit out of sorts.”

Mrs. Peachtree had asked for something sweet earlier, and had searched the kitchen for a bit of cake or cookie. What she found, were the saran-wrapped brownies clearly labeled with the universal skull and crossbones:

MIKE ONLY. DO NOT EAT.

These brownies were hidden behind the coffee maker, under the paper towels, empty Chinese take-out containers, and brown bananas, not accessible at all, tucked away under layers upon layers of plastic wrap, clearly labeled “Mike’s” with black sharpie. Clearly, not for public consumption, and definitely not for minister and his wife’s consumption.

These were not your family-friendly brownies, but rather a carefully concocted recipe of high-test hashish melted and swirled into chocolate, the very fumes of which could have gotten us all arrested. We gave our dad just a stamp-sized bite to help alleviate nausea, pain, and effects of end-stage pancreatic cancer, and a stamp-sized bite was all he needed to take the edge off.

High-test hashish brownies at the Superbowl Party

Mrs. Peachtree did not sneak a teeny tiny morsel, tearing away a chocolatey corner from under the clearly marked do-not-touch plastic wrap. She ate an entire fist-sized brownie, and her 80-year-old, 5 foot, less than a hundred pound frame was processing that brownie rather effectively.

“My heavens, is this what it’s like to be intoxicated?”

“Oh, my,” she said in a sing-song voice, clutching my shirt with both hands and swaying back and forth, trying to maintain her balance on her quickly spinning earth. “My heavens, is this what it’s like to be, to be, to be in-tox-i-cate-d?” she whispered rather loudly directly into my face.

I reassured her it was, and that she’d be fine, but perhaps we should go sit down.

“Be a dear, and don’t tell Raymond,” she whispered a little too loudly not into my ear, but into my shirt with her forehead resting directly on my chest. She wanted nothing more than to hide her buzz from her minister husband, but this was not to be, someone was going to have to be DD, and it was going to have to be her 85-year-old husband who had given up driving months ago due to a bum leg that couldn’t keep up with his stellar mind.

“Oooh, Kathy my dear. Shhhhhh, you won’t tell anyone will you? So this is in-tox-i-cate-d! Quite interesting, but I dare say, I do not believe I enjoy this very much.” She paused, considering. “No, I do not. Do you? People do this? Why? I should not have snuck a brownie. Are they all like this? Does this happen to everyone? Oh my, it is rather interesting,” and giggles erupted from her spontaneously, then stopped abruptly as her quick brain struggled to keep up.

“Am I under-the-influence? Does it feel like this all the time?”

For someone so smart, so kind, so giving, I am not sure if she wanted others to avoid the effects of the brownies, or if she was wanted to share the experience. Her questions were endless, her grip tight on my shirt, her eyes focusing and refocusing on something I could not see.

“Will this last long? Are you moving or am I moving? I am not sure I like this. So this is in-tox-i-cate-d. Do you think Raymond will notice? I doubt Raymond will notice.”

Both exhilarated and hugely embarrassed by the experience, Mrs. Peachtree didn’t want anyone to know what happened, except, too late. Word spread, and the teenagers were staged out of sight behind her, all with their cellphones aimed, capturing the buzzed moments, before sworn to secrecy and threatened from ever sharing. (I took no pledge.)

My rather-attractive-husband ran interference with the good Reverend, while my sister gave a play-by-play to our dying dad, whose riddled body shook with laughter. Nobody was watching the game any longer, too much going on in the hallway.

Parting words of wisdom

Raymond was on to her, and quite amused at the frivolity of the encounter. We offered to drive them the short ride home, or have one of the teenagers do it, but all attempts refused.

After carefully escorting first Reverend Peachtree to the car, and helping him adjust the seat and mirrors to drive home, tucking his cane nearby, we basically carried Mrs. Peachtree to the passenger seat, helping her buckle up amidst giggles that it tickled, before she escaped, climbing back out to give us hugs all around.

She would have definitely been the: “Awww, man, I love you guys” type of wasted college kid, had she picked up the brownie habit some 60 or so years earlier.

Buckled in, she waved good-bye and blew kisses, while my rather-attractive-husband, shared this parting words of wisdom to her husband:

“Listen Reverend, you didn’t hear it from me, but drive quickly. If you get home soon, you just might get lucky.”

Are you kidding me??

“Not funny!!” I boomed across the roof of the car, trying to thwart continued frat-boy tips he felt obligated to share with the driver: the revered academic scholar, well-respected minister, famed theologian, historian, professor, dean, and our close family friend, advisor, and mentor,  to which I was blatantly ignored.

“Okay, okay, okay. Forget that. Regardless, Mr. Peachtree, drive safely. And you might want to stop for Doritos and Ramen for the Mrs.. Maybe a Dr. Pepper. Just sayin’.”