Campus Cannabis

"It's kind of weird to be a drug dealer, no lie."

Pot potential


I was broke and needed a way to get cash quick. I never saw it being a more than a one-time thing, really. My roommate had a connection, so he hooked me up and I gave him part of the profit because of it. The guy I bought from has a regular job, but he sells a lot and makes a lot of money.


I'm not exactly sure who he got his stuff from, but there are three of four main suppliers in Ithaca and eight or nine grow houses in the area. They supply a lot of the Northeast and the Atlantic. So I know he was connected to one of the main suppliers. It was a pretty simple process. I bought from him, I sold to others. We tried to keep our interaction minimal.


I sold pot mainly, but if I could get it, I'd sell 'shrooms [hallucinogenic mushrooms] for friends and stuff. I'd buy it two to three ounces at a time, sometimes up to a quarter pound. I sold midis [Midland marijuana, a cheaper form of the drug that is less potent] and would sell it for a markup, but it was still cheaper than any other weed on campus.


So I'd normally make about $10 for every quarter that I sold, I'd sell a quarter for 50, sometimes 55. Even though it was shitty weed, people couldn't beat the price, so I never had any complaints.

Easy livin'


I started off selling to friends and random people that I happened to know, and they told their friends who told their friends and so on. Business started expanding through word of mouth. I also sought out clients, like I'd casually mention it to people. Slipping it into conversations became an art, really; I'd try to figure out ways to bring it up. 


The transactions were always easy. People called me and I'd get it to them. Just by selling two ounces a week, I'd make an extra hundred bucks or more. This money was on top of my regular job. And there were perks ñ I could smoke for free. It's so expensive to buy it all the time, and it was cheaper to just buy a lot and sell it off and then smoke the profit.


As for the monetary profit, I spent it on day-to-day things; first it helped me pay for food and rent. I live off-campus because it's cheaper, but it was still hard to afford. But after the first two months or so, it wasn't just the rent the pot was paying for. It allowed me to live a much more comfortable life.

Going straight


It did get to the point though where I was just going crazy. I smoked so much of the pot. I guess that the ultimate foray out of drug dealing is smoking your stash and not being able to afford to buy more. But I also hated people calling me for drugs all the time. I mean, if you deal pot, people are inevitably going to call and ask you for other stuff. If I could get it for them, I would. But I don't necessarily feel like becoming a coke dealer. 


Stopping was harder than I thought it would be. Sometimes I even miss it. I definitely miss the money. I worked 45 hours over Thanksgiving break, and I used to work four hours or less for the same amount of money. It's harder, but I don't want to get back into it. It's kind of weird to be a drug dealer, no lie. I always thought of it when I was buying at a younger age as it being the sketchiest situation with the sketchiest person, and I realized that I had become the sketchy person. It just got old.


Plus, I got paranoid. I had a pay-as-you-go phone that I paid for with cash so that it couldn't be connected to my name. If someone called my real number and said the word 'pot,' I'd get stiff. And I always had a massive amount of it on me. All the time.


Yeah, I live off-campus so there's no chance of a raid, but if there was a party, we'd load it into my car. I know I'd be much too small time for the cops to give a crap. They wouldn't hunt me down and take me out as a drug dealer or anything, but there are people that they would go after that I'm connected to. If they went after my supplier, and certainly his supplier who has to be a target, they could use me to get to them. I just don't wanna be in that situation.

I might be small fries, but small fries still come from potatoes.

*Name has been changed

Donny still smokes for pleasure but struggles to pay his rent check every month. The temptation to go back to dealing hasn't gotten to him yet, but he says when it does it may be hard to resist: "I've got a year and a half left until I graduate, and to be honest, I've gotta pay the bills."