INDOOR GARDEN | CANNABIS
A Life of Crime
Well, a couple of years anyway
In 2004, I lived in Portland in an apartment that I liked. I liked my life there too — I’d been laid off from my job, had taken my little severance packet and gone to yoga teacher training for ten weeks in LA.
Other than a daily yoga class, I didn’t have any responsibilities. I was in a wonderful place spiritually and couldn’t imagine anything would ever assail that.
Then I remember asking the Divine to “stir the pot,” because, frankly, I was bored.
Always responsive, the Divine, in the form of my landlord, Lou, informed me that he and his wife were going to have a baby and eventually, they’d need the house back. My apartment was the daylight basement and with a new one on the way, they’d need the space.
“Take your time,” he said. “We don’t really need it for another six months.”
I went online and found a property in the wilds of Washington state. It was off-grid, five acres, and a great price — probably because it was off-grid, distressed, and, honestly, a real shite hole. I had my misgivings but the realtor was silver-tongued and quick-talked me through any and all trepidation.
So within a couple of months of notice from Lou, I packed up my apartment, rented a U-Haul and a trailer for my car, and set off for my new home, about a two-hour drive to Olympia, however, the property, being so far off the freeway, was closer to a three-hour drive.
I didn’t have a tub in the apartment and I looked forward to a hot bath at the new house when I arrived. Turns out the propane tank was empty. No hot water. And the battery bank was shot — no power. And in the days ahead, I’d have to learn about the inverter and get firewood for the winter. The wood shed was empty. Oh, and the diesel tank: empty.
I hated it there from the get-go. I hated the drive. I hated the feel of the place out in the Bald Hills. It wasn’t an idyllic forest setting, it was a clear cut with second growth and there was nothing pretty or inspiring about it.
I tried to make peace with it but mostly I just wondered what the feck was I thinking. And, I did this to myself.
Within the first year, a distant relative who lived north of Seattle visited. She was a character. Smart. Cute. Savvy. I showed her around my place.
Chloe didn’t work at a regular job and I wondered how she supported herself.
“I have an indoor garden,” she confided. And after a brief pause. “And you could too. This place is perfect for it.”
“The shop — that room with the separate entrance. Made to order. And that room in the front of the shop — the ‘office,’ that could be the dry room.
“Of course, you’ll need to set it up — power outlets, heavy duty power cords, lights — metal halide and high-pressure sodium, a thousand watts each, reflective sheets to line the grow room, fans …
Whoa, wait a minute, I’m thinking. Sounds like a lot of work, a big learning curve, and some major expense. We were dying out here financially …
And then she said those magic words: when it gets going, after six months or so, your first real harvest, you can make lots of Benjamins — $10k a month.
Teaching yoga, I was making the princely sum of $55 a class and the most I could do was three a day, which involved travel to Gig Harbor, Seattle, Kirkland, Issaquah.
“What about the risk of getting caught?” I asked.
“Not very likely,” Chloe said. “Especially out here, off-grid. People get busted when the power company reports excess usage. But heck, you won’t have to worry about that.
“The other way growers get caught is if someone turns them in. A relationship gone sour. So the fewer who know about it, the better.
“And the last thing is, keep the entire number of plants under 100 — clones and adults. If caught, there’s a lot stiffer penalty for more than 100 plants.”
What about distribution?
“I’ll take care of that. I have contacts.”
We worked out a tentative agreement — we’d do the day-to-day running of the show, Chloe would return for trim and she’d provide contacts for distribution. She’d get a percentage.
It didn’t take me any more convincing. But I needed to run it by Jake and Angela, who lived with me.
Jake was in, enthusiastic. Angela was tepid at best. She feared being busted. The thought of payday, however, had its appeal but she wasn’t going to be involved in any of it. Jake and I would do the set-up, funding, and day-to-day work.
And that is how Jake, Chloe and I became partners in crime — an indoor garden.
Chloe had the knowledge and she told us what we needed, where to get it, and how to set it all up.
Jake did a lot of the physical work — he was the foreman. I was his assistant. And we hired his brother, never the wiser, to adapt the electrical system, the heart, soul and power of which was Henry, the diesel generator that we would eventually have to keep humming for, ideally, 18 hours a day.
We lined the room with mylar, a reflective sheeting that would make the most of the light; we created separate spaces for the three stages of growth: the babies or clones, the teens — vegetative, and the adults — flowers. Each had different light needs.
We set up fans to keep the room from overheating — all of those lights really generated some warmth — and a scrubber to neutralize the characteristic fragrance.
After everything was set up and the grow room was ready, we got our first delivery of clones, a variety called Pez. There were 10 perky little girls — no boys allowed since the last thing we wanted was seeds. For me, it was kind of a musical moment, Ode to Joy, or something.
We carefully placed the babies in their crib, a black plastic starter tray with a clear dome lid positioned atop a heating pad under a fluorescent light.
We spritzed and watered and cared for them lovingly. And they grew.
We bought organic growing soil by the bale, and once the babies reached the next phase, we transferred them into larger pots under the metal halide lights where they would ideally grow lush foliage. Their final stage of growth, when they flowered into fat, resin-coated buds, was under the high-pressure sodium lamps.
I loved them. I loved spending time in the grow room once everything was up and running. There was an energy in there that just made me happy.
Every stage of plant development was thrilling, especially budding, and resin crystals coated the flowers.
Everything was going along as it was supposed to, but our first harvest was disappointing. We got just a pound of trimmed product.
Chloe reassured us that this was normal. It would take awhile before we’d get to three or four-pound harvests — but our operation should net that, she calculated.
Our second harvest was twice the first. Once it was all trimmed up and weighed, we put it in oven baking bags to mitigate the smell, I took half and Jake took half, and we did our respective deliveries.
We got comfortable with the operation: propagation; when to graduate the plants from one stage to the next; when to harvest, then dry, trim, and deliver.
Of course, nothing runs entirely smoothly. Thank God Jake was home when Henry sputtered. The fuel line had come loose and fortunately Jake caught it before a real disaster: a tank full of diesel emptied into the ground. A biohazard in addition to a financial hazard.
And there was the cost: a monthly bill for a full tank of diesel, more than $1200.
Though we lived in a rural area, we had a neighbor, Lucia, whose house was, unfortunately, situated within earshot of the generator. We did everything we could to muffle — soundproof insulation, professional sound canceling, heat-resistant soundproof fabrics — but it wasn’t enough. Henry emitted a low, steady bass rumble for 18 hours a day.
Lucia would come over and complain about how long we ran Henry — and she was right — it shouldn’t take a tenth of that time to charge up the battery bank.
And of course, once the plants matured, she’d come over and complain about the skunk smell. No doubt she could put together what was going on but she never said anything — Jake helped her out with her off-grid system when she needed it. And we were always neighborly toward her.
After paying for new expensive light bulbs, bales of organic grow medium, effective microorganisms (EM), diesel fuel, noise canceling products, tanks of CO2 — Jake’s idea, which the plants LOVED — we ended up having four harvests — four paydays over those two years. Maybe the highest was $8,000.
And by the time we paid Chloe and the costs of the operation, we probably just broke even. We weren’t extravagant and we never splurged. My visions of paying off the property were never realized. Not even close.
Neither Jake nor I used pot. Not that I associate any particular saintliness with abstinence — I just don’t have the receptors for it. I don’t like how it makes me feel. Chloe was another story and no doubt, there was some pilferage during the trim.
We kept our operation going for two years, even moved it outdoors that last summer to save fuel. But when it was over, it was over all at once. Wholesale prices fell and a falling out with Chloe ended our distribution channels. Poof.
Jake and Angela moved and I was left with a small harvest that I had no idea how to offload.
I ended up taking a risk and asking someone from yoga and as it turned out, my instinct was spot on. I sold to him at a huge discount and was just happy to be out of the business. Eventually, I found an outlet for the lights, ballasts, and fans.
I loved it. Or I should say, I loved the plants. I loved every part of the growing process. I loved the time I spent in the grow room, and sometimes I’d hang out there, basking in the happiness they emitted, even when my chores were finished.
I loved the plants at every stage: seeing them progress from clones to lush vegetation to full buds, dancing to the whir of the fans. The brilliant lights, the warmth in there when it was rainy and cold and dark outside.
It still makes my heart happy to grow things.
But growing cannabis, well, nothing else has quite come up to that.
Of course, laws have changed since we had our grow operation. It’s no longer illegal and it’s highly regulated. I’ve never been in a dispensary — it would probably just make me sad.
We never took photos of the off-grid indoor garden. Here’s my current indoor garden:
Thanks for reading. Happy gardening.
