Out of a lifetime of bad decisions, probably the worst one I ever made was to start smoking fifteen years ago. Smoking sucks! Fortunately, I think I’ve come to the end of the era. As I write this, I’m trying to suck down my last pack of cigarettes while on vacation in Tennessee.
By all accounts, I probably shouldn’t have ended up a cigarette smoker. My dad and stepmom both lit up inside, and no matter how hard they tried to contain it, the house always reeked. The place was thick with the sharp, stale haze from Misty Light 120s, and it stung my eyes. It clung to my clothes. At times, it felt difficult to breathe.
Dad also smoked a pipe, though, and that was different: aside from the pleasing aroma, there was something about the ritual -tamping the tobacco, guiding the flame through its false light, and the hour or so of bookish contemplation- that pulled me in. When I turned eighteen, Dad welcomed me into the club with a match, a tin of Carter Hall, and a set of hand-me-down pipes all my own.
Smoking a pipe isn’t anything like tearing through a pack of cigarettes. Ask ten people, and nine will tell you it smells better, for starters. The aromatic blends I smoked, like Boswell Christmas Cookie, Bear Blend, and Piper’s Pleasure, even tasted great! Unfortunately, pipes take time. Even the tiniest ones, like my little Turkish meerschaum, needed patience, and patience was hard to come by in five minutes behind the Subway where I worked.
One day, though, my friend Ashley came out back with a pack of American Spirit Blacks from the Low Bob’s down the way. A few days after that, I found out one of my best friends swore by Camel Turkish Silvers. I bummed one of each and, just like that, I was a cigarette smoker…