Fire Island. Summer. Early 1970s. I’m thirteen going on 21. Life is perfect—no mortgage, no bills, not a care in the world. I’m much older now, but then, not a single person that I loved has passed away yet. I’m delivering groceries on my bike. It’s my last run of the day to a house overlooking the beach. I know the guy who owns the house. He’s in his early thirties and he owns a sportswear company. A Manhattan apartment, a beach house on Fire Island, a successful business and single—yeah, his life doesn’t suck.

After I unload the grocery bags, he invites me to hang out with them on the deck. Cool, why not? I sit on an open chaise lounge, and in a few minutes, a woman I’ve never seen before comes out of the house and sits next to me. Tanned skin, short dark hair, baggie army surplus pants and no bra under her cotton halter top—she exudes sensuality though I barely know what the word even means.

With adolescent nonchalance I pretend to pay her little attention, but I manage to stare at her no matter which angle my head points in. I study her every move, every gesture, every motion of her mouth as she speaks, laughs or gently bites her lower lip. Our eyes happen to meet a few times and I swear she forms a little smile secretly meant for me; at least it’s a belief I will take to my grave.

There’s a song from a 1960s French movie coming from a couple of speakers pointing out onto the deck which overlooks the dunes and the ocean beyond. She seems to move in slow motion to this seductive music as my imagination is taken to places it has never been before. If you’ve never experienced something like this, I feel sorry for you—but if you have, then you’ve met God.

At some point, she pulls out a small plastic bag of “special herbs” from a side hip pocket. Its smell is pungent and unmistakable. In a few minutes, she’s rolled a joint, lights it and takes a hit. Her eyes close and her head tilts back for a moment. She leans forward to pass it to a guy sitting across from her. As she does, her shirt hikes up exposing a tattoo of a crescent moon on her lower back. It’s framed on both sides by her sacral dimples—and those in turn have wisps of fine sun-kissed hairs swirling around them.

Someone drops the stylus on Eldorado by the Electric Light Orchestra. I don’t indulge in the weed that night. I don’t need to—gazing up at a billion stars of the Milky Way to the sounds of ELO and her intoxicating scent of salt air mixed with Coppertone has me as high as high gets.

I never knew her name, never saw her again and have never forgotten her or that night. I simply remember her as “Moon” for that small tattoo. I can’t hear Can’t Get it Out of My Head without being brought back to that moment and the intensity of those feelings. Is there anything more painful yet more sublime than our first unrequited love?

Moon Flower is dedicated to her. It isn’t just a cannabis brand, it’s a celebration of a beautiful time and place—the pure perfection of young love and the greatest era of music… ever.