Nancy Reagan's "Just Say No" Really Got in My Head

I'm here in Washington State right now, and in the hotel gift shop, they are selling some ash from Mount St. Helens. I remember when she blew back in 1980. I was 10 years old. I remember that my mom thought she saw volcanic ash all the way in Pekin, Illinois. I have no idea what my mother was smoking that day, but I'm fairly certain that she didn't see volcanic ash.

In the early 80s, my dad lived in Lynnwood, Washington (just north of Seattle), and the summer after my 5th Grade year (in 1981), I visited my dad for several weeks. I wish I could tell you that I fell in love with Washington that year, but I didn't. It rained and rained and rained and rained some more.

That summer, a few things stick out in my memory. First, I discovered the Ouija board. For some unknown reason, my step-mother thought it was ok to leave an 11 year old and a 9 year old alone with a Ouija board all day long. Good heavens...the spirits we conjured up from the dead were mostly good ones...but a few still freak me out today.

Second, I remember that my sis Sarah (a toddler back then) tried to ingest two snails. She said, "Look, Daddy...rocks." (Open mouth, insert pudgy little fist full of slimy snail.) That got all of the adults' attention. She lived.

Third, I remember the day that I found illegal drugs at Fred Meyer.

I was taught all kinds of things in elementary school like "Stranger Danger," "Reading is FUNdamental," and "Take a Bite Out of Crime." In short, I was a walking source of soundbites on how to be an educated and aware citizen. So, the day I found drugs at Fred Meyer....I wasn't sure what to do. I was with my dad on some shopping errand, and my dad was probably meandering in the hardware section. Near an endcap, I found a small plastic bag about one inch by one inch full of what I was convinced was "coke." Mind you, I'd never seen "coke," but I had heard about it. Also, somewhere in the back of my 11 year old mind, all drugs came in little plastic bags. I found one of these bags on the floor of a Fred Meyer, and I was faced with a moral dilemma. If I took the small bag of drugs, that would be stealing. If I left the small bag of drugs, I would be helping someone else snort coke. This is really how it processed in my mind.

As I was struggling with this moral dilemma, I decided to tell my dad about the drugs I found on the floor of the Fred Meyer. He looked at the bag of coke, looked around and found the source of the drugs. There were these commemorative plaques for the Mount St. Helens explosion, and on the back of each plaque was a small sample of volcanic ash. The bag of coke I found on the floor was really a small bag of volcanic ash from Mount St. Helens.

Whew! Crisis averted. No one would die from snorting volcanic ash!

It's funny the things we learn as kids, how we incorporate them....and the odd reason that this memory has stuck with me for 30 years!

The gift store volcanic ash triggered this childhood memory. Yeah, I'm a freak!