Hey...we know you're busy!
You get up at the crack of
dawn to go to school, channel surf with a web browser or
remote control from the minute you get home until somebody yells
at you to do your homework, listen to music, go to movies, and
hang with your friends.
Maybe you play drums or video
games, collect comics or photos of your favorite band or hip-hop
group. Someday, you want to be a doctor, a model, or the next
Michael Jordan or Bill Gates.
(Somebody's gotta do it!)
Or maybe you don't have a serious
clue exactly what you want to be. But what you are right now is busy.
You do your homework and you
help around the house. You make your bed and sometimes you make
your mom, dad, or Great Aunt Nellie nervous.
So why should you spend time
learning about drugs and drinking, and the problems they can
cause?
For a lot of reasons.
One of the biggest reasons of
all is that we live in a world where chemicals are all around.
And drugs and alcohol can cause a world
of problems for people who don't know the facts about them.
Like it or not (and whether or
not you think anyone else grasps this fact),
you're also becoming an adult, and starting to make major decisions
for yourself.
And one of the most important
decisions you'll ever have to make is whether to drink or try
drugs.
Think about it: Nobody ever sets out to become a drug abuser or an alcoholic.
No kid ever woke up one morning and decided to have a drug problem someday. But millions of people do--and
millions more have trouble with alcohol.
Why? Often, it's because they
didn't know what they were getting into when they first got into
drugs and alcohol. Either they didn't have the facts or they
thought they were too
smart (or too cool)
for problems to happen to them.
But here's the catch: Being cool
or smart about other stuff doesn't have that much to do
with it.
Ask Kurt Cobain or Chris
Farley--or any of the
tens of thousands of others
whose lives are wasted every year because of the chemicals they
thought they could get away with snorting or smoking or shooting.
That's the reason we've put together this booklet: to
make sure you've got the latest facts on alcohol and drugs, and
introduce you to some of the basics about how they work in the
body. We'll give you the straight facts, and trust you
to make the right decision for yourself.
Because making decisions for
yourself is what growing
up is all about. And making
smart choices about drugs is what being drugwise is all
about.
.
