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The Appalachian Occultist's Guide to Smoking Cannabis
Ten Rules That Keep You Laughing... and Alive
1. Never Light Up After Hearing Your Name in the Woods.
If somebody calls your name and you know every soul within ten miles is asleep, finish packing your bowl somewhere else. Whatever answered isn't trying to borrow a lighter.
2. Count Your Friends Before and After the Session.
If you started with three people and somehow four are passing the joint around... don't ask the new guy where he came from. Just leave. Quietly.
3. Don't Offer the Forest the First Hit.
Old-timers pour out whiskey for the dead. That's their business. If you exhale your first cloud toward the trees and something exhales back... congratulations, you've made a terrible new friend.
4. Respect the Whip-poor-will.
If the bird stops singing all at once, your smoke break is over. Go inside. Lock the door. You can always finish the dab tomorrow.
5. Never Follow a Lantern Through the Fog.
Especially if the person carrying it walks without making a sound. People leave footprints. Most other things don't.
6. If Every Dog Starts Barking at Once... Pack It Up.
Dogs argue with raccoons.
Dogs bark at bears.
Dogs howl at coyotes.
When every dog in the valley suddenly goes dead silent after barking...
They lost the argument.
7. Don't Smoke Beside Old Cemeteries.
It's rude.
Besides, if someone you've never met starts giving you life advice at two in the morning...
He's probably been dead longer than you've been alive.
8. If Your Joint Won't Stay Lit... Neither Should You.
Sometimes it's damp.
Sometimes it's cheap weed.
But if your lighter works everywhere except facing the woods...
The mountain voted "no."
9. Don't Laugh at Local Superstitions While You're High.
Nothing humbles a skeptic faster than realizing the tree you've been leaning against has been slowly breathing for the last fifteen minutes.
10. If You Hear Someone Say, "Mind If I Get a Hit?"... Without Seeing Anyone...
You have two choices.
Say no...
...and hope it respects boundaries.
Or say yes...
...and hope it only wanted the weed.
Either way...
You're probably not sleeping tonight.
Appalachian Occultist's Golden Rule
The cannabis didn't summon the strange things.
It just convinced you to notice they were already there.
Sleep well. The mountains rarely do

Malach had lived a life where every time he managed to build something worth keeping, it vanished. A home became ashes. Friendships rotted into silence. Love slipped through his fingers like rain through dead leaves. Every victory was followed by another loss so perfectly timed that it stopped feeling like bad luck and started feeling like someone unseen was watching, waiting for the exact moment hope took root before ripping it out. The forests around his home seemed to know his name, and every gust of wind sounded like laughter muffled behind ancient trees.
One storm-ridden evening, with thunder crawling across the sky like a wounded beast, Malach wandered into the woods. He reached a clearing where the trees formed a perfect circle, their trunks twisted inward as if staring at him. There, exhausted beyond anger, he fell to his knees. His voice cracked as he shouted into the darkness, "Why? Why do You keep taking everything from me? What did I do?" The woods answered only with the groan of branches bending where there was no wind.
Then every sound in the forest died. The insects stopped. The frogs fell silent. Even the rain seemed afraid to fall. From somewhere that wasn't above, below, or around him—but everywhere at once—a presence awoke. It was older than mountains and heavier than the sky. The trees creaked as though they were bowing before it, and Malach felt his heartbeat slow against his will.
The voice finally came. It was not spoken. It was forced into his bones with the weight of a collapsing world. "BECAUSE YOU KEEP BUILDING ON WHAT MUST FALL!" The earth trembled beneath him. The bark split from the surrounding trees. "I DID NOT TAKE YOUR LIFE TO PUNISH YOU. I TORE IT APART BECAUSE EACH TIME YOU BUILT IT WRONG." The words struck harder than lightning. "BUILD IT RIGHT THIS TIME!" The command echoed again and again until it no longer sounded like a voice, but like the forest itself screaming through every leaf and root.
When the silence returned, Malach was alone. The clearing looked untouched, yet every tree now leaned slightly toward him, as if waiting to see what he would do next. As he stumbled back toward home, he noticed something that chilled him more than the voice ever could. Every footprint he left behind filled itself in, erased the moment he took another step, as though the woods were reminding him that the past was gone forever—and that whatever came next had to be built from nothing.

When the whippoorwill sings and the pine trees sway,
Little ones, don't wander far away.
Stay by the fire where the bright sparks glow,
'Cause things in the dark ain't meant to know.
If you hear your name from the creek at night,
But Mama's inside by the lantern light,
Cover your ears and don't you go,
Some voices ain't voices you're meant to know.
If a lady in white comes walking the trail,
With a crooked grin and a tattered veil,
Look at your feet and pass on by,
Don't meet the witch's hungry eye.
If something scratches at your bedroom wall,
Don't scratch back and don't make a call.
Pull up your quilt and say your prayer,
Some things get stronger when they know you're there.
If the dogs won't bark and the crickets stop,
And the woods go still as a raindrop's drop,
Shut the door and tend the flame,
The old things know when you speak their name.
So mind your folks and heed this rhyme,
The hills get strange come nighttime.
Stay in the light till the morning's born,
And you'll wake safe with the crow of dawn.

I spent years earning imaginary trophies for a game I never wanted to play.
"Good girl." "Be nice." "Don't say that." "Tone it down." "Smile." "Forgive." "Be the bigger person."
So I swallowed whole pieces of myself just to keep everyone else comfortable.
I starved my own soul to feed your version of me.
And you all clapped.
Until I stopped performing.
Turns out...
the applause was rented.
Miss one payment, lose the audience.
The money disappeared.
The title disappeared.
The convenience disappeared.
Then every motherfucker who swore, "I'll always be here..."
...vanished like smoke owing me nothing except a lesson.
You didn't love me.
You loved how easy I made your life.
You loved the version of me that never asked questions, never had boundaries, never said, "Go fuck yourself."
See...
I thought I was building a family.
I was building a fan club.
Fans don't stay when the lights go out.
They just look for another stage.
So there I stood...
No applause. No audience. No script. No backup plan.
Just me.
The same me I'd buried alive to keep strangers comfortable.
Funny thing about rock bottom...
It's quiet enough to hear your own voice again.
Mine said,
"Who the fuck have you been apologizing for?"
Not anymore.
You don't get front-row seats to a life you only watched when admission was free.
Your opinion?
It's a receipt for a debt I never owed.
Keep it.
I'm done paying for acceptance with pieces of myself.
From now on...
If my existence offends you—
Die mad.
I'll be too busy becoming the person you were always afraid I'd become.
Unfiltered.
Unapologetic.
Unowned.
— Rebel Rose