My hubby has also gone into this act. Sutanu has written this for me.
Manjari does not like Bhang, ganja or any of the other psychotropic cousins. I also don’t get it, albeit for altogether different reasons. Nevertheless, there is some chutzpah about all this bhang/ganja business. Presumably one third of our holy trinity relished it….so do our various sadhus & babas from time immemorial, but while Shivji’s symbolism gets all love, affections, rubbing and milk, his taste for bhang never really got the social acceptance, much less the love. But neither has it really been relegated to dustbins of disuse. Even outside the desi frame of reference, ganja did make its discreet touch of influence felt. Kublai Khan got stalled by that dude from Porlock, but it did get its start & creative intensity from the little help from friends that Coleridge got. Benzene & ring would have been forever disassociated if Kekule never had his rather perspicacious dream. Beatles, of course, gladly tomtomed about their Lucy and her diamonds.  Manet had his “absinthe drinker”. And Doors had opened their doors of perception. Lastly and allegedly,  April being the cruelest month and all that sublime imagery & wordplay which made “Wasteland” the 20th century canon did have some mescalin power behind it.
Bur let’s leave all the holier & greater minds aside. Let’s just share our story of one holi. Cannabis Indica or bhang/ganja is actually legal in 14 US states & in some Indian ones too like Oddisa. In fact during shivratri, Holi, Bhang is procured over the counter in certain govt. approved shops. Armed with these ephemeral signs of legality & implied approval, in this holi party we decided to serve bhang. Naivety made us churn a disproportionate amount of Bhang with some milk. It was churned. Just about. And lo and behold, the elixir was served with gusto. When we lost count of how many guests had came, we blamed it to our combined poor arithmetic skills. Finally in late afternoon, both of us sat, after our guests had left, to taste our sip of the ambrosia. And sip we did. And with the sips of the last drags of the concoction, we slept.
Cut to early evening. I was woken by a rather sluggish Manjari. With a quizzical expression on her face she was in the floor, seemingly searching for something. She solemnly declared that she has lost her tongue & was searching for it.
It was a bona-fide crisis.
More so, for as I thought that if her tongue gone on an unsanctioned jaunt and if we do not find it in time, there is a good chance it might end up as unexpected but welcome snack for one or either of our two dogs.
For the next two hours we searched for her tongue. The tongue remained lost.
In hindsight, all this would have been just sad, but it turned out to be a singular tragedy for me. At some time after the two hours, from a collaborative, understanding & helpful husband, I transformed to be a persona non grata. I guess, I should have never expressed my delight of realizing that the world just might be better off with one less amplified chatterbox.
Next morning, we had recovered. Most of the antics were forgotten except the comment.
As a penance, I had to buy this saree. And I bought the green hued, bhang colored saree as a reminder of our sins.