My sister said in an e-mail that she missed my "rants" so here goes.I used to be a smoker. I started in college. I remember when I first started I sneaked around so my grandfather and mother (who both smoked) would not know I was a smoker. My grandfather started smoking cigars to kill the smell of the animals he was working on as a veterinarian. (I used to watch him do a post-mortem on a hog and I don't remember the smell being that bad.)
Actually smoking was common in my family, My grandmother smoked and many other relatives were smokers. Nobody thought anything about it. I sure didn't. Smoking was commonly done all over the place.
My grandfather's brother Uncle Lew took me aside one time and took out his wallet. I was still in grade school at the time. He took out $100. and told me that it would be mine if I never smoked until after I was out of school. I made it (sort of) but he died before he could make good on his promise. I say sort of because a buddy of mine in fifth grade in Atlantic, Iowa rolled p some paper and put some kind of weed and tried to smoke it. Our lungs were burned.
Speaking of Atlantic - one consequence of smoking was the time my mother set the house on fire. My step-father was sleeping out on a cot in the dining room because it was so warm that night. Mother went to bed and lit a cigarette. She evidently missed the ash tray and caught the mattress on fire which in turn, caught the curtains on fire. They heard my mother scream three blocks away. The firemen came and put the fire out. My sister was still a tiny baby so it was probably the summer of 1952 when it happened. We were lucky but there were some funny moments. All of us tried to put the fire out. Running right through the bathroom to get to the water in the kitchen. The lady who lived upstairs came down the steps and saw my step-father (who slept in the nude) and realized that she was topless. I got water with a frying pan and tried to beat the fire out with a feather pillow which caught on fire and we had feathers all over the house to clean up.
A fire that wasn't funny was when my cousin Jan took up smoking again after quitting. She had gained weight and this was an attempt to lose weight. Evidently an ash dropped into her recliner and after she went to bed the chair and then the house caught on fire. She burned to death trapped in her bedroom Both her boys escaped (not without injury) but they lost their mother.
As I said both mother and I used to smoke. We did not think anything of it and did not realize then just how obnoxious smoking was. I quit the first time when I joined the Christian Science Church and the method I used worked quickly. I took a baggie and filled it with cigarette butts and ashes. I carried it around with me and when I wanted a cigarette I opened the baggie and took a whiff. It didn't take long to not want to smoke. I also kept a half a carton of cigarettes in the freezer so that I knew that I could go and have one any time I wanted.
Of course food tasted better and things smelled better and I gained weight. Later I left the church and took up smoking again. I was fine with this for a couple of years until I realized that I was coughing and hacking and not enjoying it so I went through the process again. and food tasted better and things smelled better and I gained more weight but at least I got rid of the cough.
How much did I smoke? Was I truly a smoker? I was truly a smoker. I smoked almost three packs of cigarettes a day. I could suck in the smoke of three cigarettes in one fifteen minute break. I was not like my cousin Chris who only smoked three or four months of the year and them put them away. I was hooked.
Well, I quit and I am glad I did but I became ultra sensitive to the smell of smoke. When kids who lived in a house with smokers would bring in their homework I could smell the smoke on their papers. When around people (even today) who smoke I can smell it on them. The other day at Quizmos a woman was in her SUV out in front and when she finally came in she stood next to me. I could smell the smoke on her.
If I loan a book to a smoker I have to use Fabreeze on it and air it out before I can read it again. I stopped checking out books at the library for the most part because of the cigarette smell coming out of the books. I try to sniff them first now. But that is my problem. Another part of the problem is going out to eat. It is not a problem in Ames as much because we had a no smoking ordinance for awhile and most restaurants have not gone back to allowing smoking on the premises.
It is different in other cities. I once ate at the Drake Diner in Des Moines and thought sitting out on the patio would be a nice thing. It was until a woman with a family came down and sat right across from me and proceeded to light up. As she spewed her obnoxious aroma in my direction I asked to move inside which was non-smoking.
So there we were I had quit smoking but my mother was still a smoker. And it got worse. She would light a cigarette up and as soon as it was finished she'd light another one. She knew something was wrong with her health but (like me) she didn't want to face it so she just kept smoking more and more. I finally took her to the doctor for tests and it came back that she had COPD. She was told to "quit smoking" and I can still hear the panic in her voice when she asked how she could do it. I told her that she could quit smoking and that she could do it so that her grandson could grow up with a memory of her. So she used my method and it was cold turkey and she resented it for the rest of her life. She was mad at me when we moved and I threw the stored cigarettes out. ( I really believe she intended to take up smoking again).
When people would come for a visit she would encourage them to smoke even though she knew the doctor did not want people to smoke around her. I finally had to put my foot down about that. I can still remember wend we had visitors at the house and the woman was a smoker. I got up one morning and the whole house reeked of smoke. We lived in a split foyer home and I had the downstairs. I opened up every window in the downstairs to air the place out. Martina said something about the smoke when I came upstairs and I told her that I had already opened up the downstairs. (I wasn't a very nice host.)
Thanks to Dr.'s Fawcett and Gohman my mother had years tacked onto her life. Her color got better and she was able to leave a memory with her grandson. They loved each other (even if he did think she cheated at cards). She did have to carry an oxygen bottle around and we had to have a machine in the house to help her breathe and in the end it killed her, but, she was with us for at least six years longer than she would have been if she had not given up smoking.
Me, Yes, I quit and I am glad I did. I had dreams of buying cigarettes and smoking them for years after I quit. I think that if I were to take it up again I would be right up to three packs a day in no time at all. They are probably the most addictive drug of choice around and I am glad that it is becoming less and less acceptable for people to smoke.
One of the Masonic lists I am on helps sponsor the "Masonic Week" in Washington D.C. some of the members were bemoaning the fact that they couldn't smoke in the Hotel any longer and were speaking of the "pleasures" of smoking and having a cigar now and then. That is fine with me. I avoid smoking places and if I do go there I come home and strip off my (now) smoke smelling garments and throw them into the wash immediately. There is nothing worse than a reformed smoker. This says it all:
Country-western songwriter and entertainer Sollie "Tex" Williams, a heavy smoker best known for his tune, "Smoke, Smoke, Smoke That Cigarette," died after a year-long battle with cancer, his daughter said. . . . her father, who was diagnosed a year ago as having cancer, smoked two packs of cigarettes a day, dropping to about a pack a day before he died. "He tried to quit, but he couldn't," she said.
Now I'm a fellow with a heart of gold
And the ways of a gentleman I've been told
Kind-of-a-guy that wouldn't even harm a flea
But if me and a certain character met
The guy that invented that cigarette
I'd murder that son-of-a gun in the first degree
It ain't cuz I don't smoke 'em myself
and i don't reckon that it'll hinder your health
I smoked 'em all my life and I ain't dead yet
But nicotine slaves are all the same
at a pettin' party or a poker game
Everything gotta stop while they have a cigarette
CHORUS
Smoke, smoke, smoke that cigarette
Puff, puff, puff until you smoke yourself to death.
Tell St. Peter at the Golden Gate
That you hate to make him wait,
But you just gotta have another cigarette.
In a game of chance the other night
Old dame fortune was good and right
The kings and queens they kept on comin' around
Aw, I was hittin' em good and bettin' 'em high
But my bluff didn't work on a certain guy
He kept callin' and layin' his money down
See, he'd raise me then I'd raise him
and I'd say to him buddy ya gotta sink or swim
Finally called me but didn't raise the bet!
--Hmmph! I said Aces Full Pal -- I got you!
He said, "I'll pay up in a minute or two
But right now, i just gotta have another cigarette."
CHORUS
Now the other night I had a date
with the cutest little gal in any state
A high-bred, uptown, fancy little dame
She said she loved me and it seemd to me
That things were sorta like they oughtta be
So hand in hand we strolled down lovers lane
She was a long way from a chunk of ice
And our pettin' party was goin' real nice
And I got an idea I might have been there yet
So I give her a kiss and a little squeeze
Then she said, "Travis, Excuse me Please
But I just gotta have a cigarette."
I am not going to go into the health hazards of smoking - they have been known since at least 1947 and all packages have warnings printed on them. I don't miss smoking but I sometimes miss the sociability of smoking but there are other ways to be sociable. So that's it Ginny- You got your (rather lengthy) rant. Be loved and tell Bruce to quit smoking (yeah right!) Hugs, j
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