From contracostatimes.com:

In her 88 years, Florence Siegel has learned how to relax: A glass of red wine. A crisp copy of The New York Times, if she can wrest it from her husband. Some classical music, preferably Bach. And every night like clockwork, she lifts a pipe to her lips and smokes marijuana.
Long a fixture among young people, use of the country%u2019s most popular illicit drug is now growing among the AARP set, as the massive generation of baby boomers who came of age in the 1960s and %u201970s grows older.

The number of people aged 50 and older reporting marijuana use in the prior year went up from 1.9 percent to 2.9 percent from 2002 to 2008, according to surveys from the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.

The rise was most dramatic among 55- to 59-year-olds, whose reported marijuana use more than tripled from 1.6 percent in 2002 to 5.1 percent.

Observers expect further increases as 78 million boomers born between 1945 and 1964 age. For many boomers, the drug never held the stigma it did for previous generations, and they tried it decades ago.

Some have used it ever since, while others are revisiting the habit in retirement, either for recreation or as a way to cope with the aches and pains of aging.

Siegel walks with a cane and has arthritis in her back and legs. She finds marijuana has helped her sleep better than pills ever did. And she can%u2019t figure out why everyone her age isn%u2019t sharing a joint, too.

%u201CThey%u2019re missing

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a lot of fun and a lot of relief,%u201D she said.
Politically, advocates for legalizing marijuana say the number of older users could represent an important shift in their decades-long push to change the laws.

%u201CFor the longest time, our political opponents were older Americans who were not familiar with marijuana and had lived through the %u2018Reefer Madness%u2019 mentality and they considered marijuana a very dangerous drug,%u201D said Keith Stroup, the founder and lawyer of NORML, a marijuana advocacy group.

%u201CNow, whether they resume the habit of smoking or whether they simply understand that it%u2019s no big deal and that it shouldn%u2019t be a crime, in large numbers they%u2019re on our side of the issue.%u201D

Each night, 66-year-old Stroup says he sits down to the evening news, pours himself a glass of wine and rolls a joint. He%u2019s used the drug since he was a freshman at Georgetown, but many older adults are revisiting marijuana after years away.

%u201CThe kids are grown, they%u2019re out of school, you%u2019ve got time on your hands and frankly it%u2019s a time when you can really enjoy marijuana,%u201D Stroup said. %u201CFood tastes better, music sounds better, sex is more enjoyable.%u201D

The drug is credited with relieving many problems of aging: aches and pains, glaucoma, macular degeneration, and so on. Patients in 14 states enjoy medical marijuana laws, but those elsewhere buy or grow the drug illegally to ease their conditions.

Among them is Perry Parks, 67, of Rockingham, N.C., a retired Army pilot who suffered crippling pain from degenerative disc disease and arthritis. He had tried all sorts of drugs, from Vioxx to epidural steroids, but found little success. About two years ago he turned to marijuana, which he first had tried in college, and was amazed how well it worked for the pain.

%u201CI realized I could get by without the narcotics,%u201D Parks said, referring to prescription painkillers. %u201CI am essentially pain free.%u201D

But there%u2019s also the risk that health problems already faced by older people can be exacerbated by regular marijuana use.

Older users could be at risk for falls if they become dizzy, smoking it increases the risk of heart disease and it can cause cognitive impairment, said Dr. William Dale, chief of geriatrics and palliative medicine at the University of Chicago Medical Center.

He said he%u2019d caution against using it even if a patient cites benefits.

%u201CThere are other better ways to achieve the same effects,%u201D he said.

Pete Delany, director of applied studies at the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, said boomers%u2019 drug use defied stereotypes, but is important to address.

%u201CWhen you think about people who are 50 and older you don%u2019t generally think of them as using illicit drugs%u2014the occasional Hunter Thompson or the kind of hippie dippie guy that gets a lot of press maybe,%u201D he said. %u201CAs a nation, it%u2019s important to us to say, %u2018It%u2019s not just young people using drugs it%u2019s older people using drugs.%u2019%u201D

In conversations, older marijuana users often say they smoke in less social settings than when they were younger, frequently preferring to enjoy the drug privately. They say the quality (and price) of the drug has increased substantially since their youth and they aren%u2019t as paranoid about using it.

Dennis Day, a 61-year-old attorney in Columbus, Ohio, said when he used to get high, he wore dark glasses to disguise his red eyes, feared talking to people on the street and worried about encountering police. With age, he says, any drawbacks to the drug have disappeared.

%u201CMy eyes no longer turn red, I no longer get the munchies,%u201D Day said. %u201CThe primary drawbacks to me now are legal.%u201D

Siegel bucks the trend as someone who was well into her 50s before she tried pot for the first time. She can muster only one frustration with the drug.

%u201CI never learned how to roll a joint,%u201D she said. %u201CIt%u2019s just a big nuisance. It%u2019s much easier to fill a pipe.%u201D