I'm remembering the well-furnished rooms of my foreign service days. The coffee table always had not only an ashtray (plus many more around the room) but also a handsome lighter and a silver box of high-end cigarettes. The rest of the setting included a dining room cabinet with glasses for martinis, other cocktails, white wine, red wine, cognac, and highballs. Every dinner party I hosted used ALL of them. I am amazed so many of us survived to tell the tale.
If this was from your foreign service days, what percentage of those people are you still in touch with? Is it possible that a substantial percentage are no longer with us and you just don't know it?
I don't think it was a matter of tolerating mass poisoning. I think it was the power of the cigarette to addict people. I can't remember exactly how long I smoked for, but I don't think it was more than a year--when I was in my late 30s or early 40s. But I do remember hiding my smoking and feeling VERY WEIRD about doing that when I visited my parents at their summer place on Cape Cod for several weeks. Later, I began chewing nicotine gum, which seemed like the greatest thing since cigarettes. I really loved that stuff--partly because it gave me I don't know exactly how many extra working hours it gave me in a week, but it was substantial extra working time. I really loved the stuff.
I finally ditched the nicotine gum when it started doing something really weird to my throat. I can't remember exactly what, but I knew that if I persisted with my chewing habit, I'd end up with huge regrets. And I'm glad I had a relatively easy time giving it up. After all, I still had my running, I still had driving (I have loved driving most of my life, and in my early 70s, I still do). And I have my dog.
If they could make a benign version of nicotine gum, I'd go right back to chewing it. But this is probably the first time in at least half a decade since I've thought of that. Because I know damn well they wouldn't be able to do it.
The tobacco industry is and always has been diabolical. The contents of today's cigarettes is vastly worse and very much more addictive than when I smoked 50 years ago.
Started at 13, quit at 23. It was not really hard because they hadn't started putting nicotine accelerators in the things. And...I got my oral and mental satisfaction with some weed.
The makers of tobacco products are no less guilty of murder than the people who push opiods.
The failure to hold them accountable is just another story in the American worship of profits over people. And so it goes....
Wow. What a topic. I applaud you. First, I recall the airplanes at least I think they allowed smoking. Mother smoked her Kent cigarettes. Me, I didn’t usually smoke unless I drank or did cocaine. Or heroin. Loved the speedball, a cognac and a cigarette, lol. The day my doctor found I had Hepatitis C, I walked across the street from my gallery and bought a pack of Marlboro returned to my gallery lit up and plunked my feet up on my desk and smoked.
I knew that day I would stop drinking and I did. I instructed my doc to look for protocol studies to cure Hepatitis C. Went through 2 experimental studies until a 3 drug cocktail cured me. It almost killed me at the time as my doctor wanted to stop one medication. But I succeeded in being cured. I stopped smoking. Stopped drugging. Became health conscious. The day I felt myself becoming addicted to heroin after hitting up every night for a few weeks and I knew I was one phone call away from resupplying, I broke the needles and stopped cold. I never looked back. I inherited a non addictive personality from my parents. Some folks have this while most others don’t. Today I have collected partially used bottles of legal narcotics from friends just to have supply if and when I hurt myself like the day I fell while running and I hurt my hand so I had my pain pills for a few days. That’s what they are for, after all. I have no interest getting high. I don’t get drunk. I don’t even smoke weed. I have legal weed in my top drawer with my pain pills but don’t smoke it. I run every other day. I eat low carb diet. No sugar — that’s the other poison in our diet. I also don’t eat a lot.
Once during the drug days, a high school buddy OD in an apartment where everyone was shooting up. As he was dying, I recalled the old Red Cross films from grade school of mouth to mouth. No chest compressions. Tilting the head back, pinching the nose and placing thumb in opened mouth. As I did this I almost vomited thinking he would vomit. But I had to perform it. After 20 or so seconds, he came back to life. As others walked Paul around the apartment, I slowly slipped out and went home. I don’t know if the others ever told him who saved him that night. It wasn’t important. After I returned from a 2 year sojourn to Europe, I was told Paul died of an overdose. Now I rescue cats and write and perform songs for thrills. It’s better than taking drugs and smoking and drinking, lol.
Add-on: My mother smokes all her life. She lived to 91. She only passed when she refused food at the nursing home where I never wanted her to be in. In her late years, my sister took her Kent cigs away from her. Yes she did have progressing dementia. Smoking was her last comfort enjoyment. I bought her the last enjoyment she had. She didnt remember who I was but she knew I was a member of her family and that was OK with me.
My parents (members of the "greatest generation") both began smoking cigarettes as teens. They both smoked Tareytons, and our home and car were always filled with secondary smoke. On the maternal side, my grandmother lived to 86 and my great-aunt to 94. My dad's parents died in their 60s and both of his older sisters died in their 40s, so my dad always expected to die young When my folks were in their early 40s my dad convinced my mom that they should both quite smoking. My dad did quit and my mom continued to smoke. She had hypertension, and wound up needing dialysis due to kidney failure at age 78. She died at 79 from pneumonia and lung cancer (which she had just been diagnosed with). To his surprise, my dad remained healthy, needing no medication, and played golf three or four times every week, until he was 88, at which point he was diagnosed with lung cancer (he had never resumed smoking, but the damage had apparently been done early). As for me, as I child I had repeated sinus infections and colds. Since moving out to attend college, I've never had another sinus infection and very rarely have a cold. We now know the dangers of secondary smoke.
Grew up with a chain smoking father and moderate smoking mother. The smoke was everywhere. Throughout the house, inside the car and outside on the picnic table. I couldn't escape it. I developed a chronic cough and runny nose. Our doctor said, "buy a humidifier". So they did, and I still coughed and sneezed continuously. It eventually contributed to my father's death at 65. I pestered my mother to quit and she finally did, and lived to 82 years. I picked up the habit in my teens but only occasionally, and managed to quit years later. It is extremely addictive and very difficult to muster the inner strength to just say no.
Almost everyone has their poison. Didn’t you smoke pot for decades? Why are people still allowed to eat McDonalds?? We all- as a society- pay for these bad habits. We all know what we “should “ be doing to be our healthiest - some form of daily exercise, better eating habits, avoid smoking and alcohol, spend time in nature, don’t be so sedentary (at work or at home) yet… we don’t do these things. The list goes on. 😕 what is considered acceptable may always fluctuate. Note that I said “considered acceptable “ Every culture turns a blind eye to something- many things.
These days I think voting Republican is the worst danger to everyone’s health.
It's not a "cult", it's an addiction. I'm a former smoker myself (33 years clean next month!!), and have dear friends who still smoke. Quitting is very hard and not a matter of just knowing what tobacco can do to you. I share your sadness that we still tolerate it as a society.
Often times, in the states that have legalized marijuana, people are smoking pot in those designated areas.
That will change the vibe.
I do wonder what it is about smoking that attracts people who already lean "type A". Which partially explains the culture of the "smoking area".
See my comment just one above yours, Annabel. PS: I don't think I ever would be classified as type A.
I'm remembering the well-furnished rooms of my foreign service days. The coffee table always had not only an ashtray (plus many more around the room) but also a handsome lighter and a silver box of high-end cigarettes. The rest of the setting included a dining room cabinet with glasses for martinis, other cocktails, white wine, red wine, cognac, and highballs. Every dinner party I hosted used ALL of them. I am amazed so many of us survived to tell the tale.
If this was from your foreign service days, what percentage of those people are you still in touch with? Is it possible that a substantial percentage are no longer with us and you just don't know it?
I don't think it was a matter of tolerating mass poisoning. I think it was the power of the cigarette to addict people. I can't remember exactly how long I smoked for, but I don't think it was more than a year--when I was in my late 30s or early 40s. But I do remember hiding my smoking and feeling VERY WEIRD about doing that when I visited my parents at their summer place on Cape Cod for several weeks. Later, I began chewing nicotine gum, which seemed like the greatest thing since cigarettes. I really loved that stuff--partly because it gave me I don't know exactly how many extra working hours it gave me in a week, but it was substantial extra working time. I really loved the stuff.
I finally ditched the nicotine gum when it started doing something really weird to my throat. I can't remember exactly what, but I knew that if I persisted with my chewing habit, I'd end up with huge regrets. And I'm glad I had a relatively easy time giving it up. After all, I still had my running, I still had driving (I have loved driving most of my life, and in my early 70s, I still do). And I have my dog.
If they could make a benign version of nicotine gum, I'd go right back to chewing it. But this is probably the first time in at least half a decade since I've thought of that. Because I know damn well they wouldn't be able to do it.
The tobacco industry is and always has been diabolical. The contents of today's cigarettes is vastly worse and very much more addictive than when I smoked 50 years ago.
Started at 13, quit at 23. It was not really hard because they hadn't started putting nicotine accelerators in the things. And...I got my oral and mental satisfaction with some weed.
The makers of tobacco products are no less guilty of murder than the people who push opiods.
The failure to hold them accountable is just another story in the American worship of profits over people. And so it goes....
Wow. What a topic. I applaud you. First, I recall the airplanes at least I think they allowed smoking. Mother smoked her Kent cigarettes. Me, I didn’t usually smoke unless I drank or did cocaine. Or heroin. Loved the speedball, a cognac and a cigarette, lol. The day my doctor found I had Hepatitis C, I walked across the street from my gallery and bought a pack of Marlboro returned to my gallery lit up and plunked my feet up on my desk and smoked.
I knew that day I would stop drinking and I did. I instructed my doc to look for protocol studies to cure Hepatitis C. Went through 2 experimental studies until a 3 drug cocktail cured me. It almost killed me at the time as my doctor wanted to stop one medication. But I succeeded in being cured. I stopped smoking. Stopped drugging. Became health conscious. The day I felt myself becoming addicted to heroin after hitting up every night for a few weeks and I knew I was one phone call away from resupplying, I broke the needles and stopped cold. I never looked back. I inherited a non addictive personality from my parents. Some folks have this while most others don’t. Today I have collected partially used bottles of legal narcotics from friends just to have supply if and when I hurt myself like the day I fell while running and I hurt my hand so I had my pain pills for a few days. That’s what they are for, after all. I have no interest getting high. I don’t get drunk. I don’t even smoke weed. I have legal weed in my top drawer with my pain pills but don’t smoke it. I run every other day. I eat low carb diet. No sugar — that’s the other poison in our diet. I also don’t eat a lot.
Once during the drug days, a high school buddy OD in an apartment where everyone was shooting up. As he was dying, I recalled the old Red Cross films from grade school of mouth to mouth. No chest compressions. Tilting the head back, pinching the nose and placing thumb in opened mouth. As I did this I almost vomited thinking he would vomit. But I had to perform it. After 20 or so seconds, he came back to life. As others walked Paul around the apartment, I slowly slipped out and went home. I don’t know if the others ever told him who saved him that night. It wasn’t important. After I returned from a 2 year sojourn to Europe, I was told Paul died of an overdose. Now I rescue cats and write and perform songs for thrills. It’s better than taking drugs and smoking and drinking, lol.
Add-on: My mother smokes all her life. She lived to 91. She only passed when she refused food at the nursing home where I never wanted her to be in. In her late years, my sister took her Kent cigs away from her. Yes she did have progressing dementia. Smoking was her last comfort enjoyment. I bought her the last enjoyment she had. She didnt remember who I was but she knew I was a member of her family and that was OK with me.
My parents (members of the "greatest generation") both began smoking cigarettes as teens. They both smoked Tareytons, and our home and car were always filled with secondary smoke. On the maternal side, my grandmother lived to 86 and my great-aunt to 94. My dad's parents died in their 60s and both of his older sisters died in their 40s, so my dad always expected to die young When my folks were in their early 40s my dad convinced my mom that they should both quite smoking. My dad did quit and my mom continued to smoke. She had hypertension, and wound up needing dialysis due to kidney failure at age 78. She died at 79 from pneumonia and lung cancer (which she had just been diagnosed with). To his surprise, my dad remained healthy, needing no medication, and played golf three or four times every week, until he was 88, at which point he was diagnosed with lung cancer (he had never resumed smoking, but the damage had apparently been done early). As for me, as I child I had repeated sinus infections and colds. Since moving out to attend college, I've never had another sinus infection and very rarely have a cold. We now know the dangers of secondary smoke.
Grew up with a chain smoking father and moderate smoking mother. The smoke was everywhere. Throughout the house, inside the car and outside on the picnic table. I couldn't escape it. I developed a chronic cough and runny nose. Our doctor said, "buy a humidifier". So they did, and I still coughed and sneezed continuously. It eventually contributed to my father's death at 65. I pestered my mother to quit and she finally did, and lived to 82 years. I picked up the habit in my teens but only occasionally, and managed to quit years later. It is extremely addictive and very difficult to muster the inner strength to just say no.
Almost everyone has their poison. Didn’t you smoke pot for decades? Why are people still allowed to eat McDonalds?? We all- as a society- pay for these bad habits. We all know what we “should “ be doing to be our healthiest - some form of daily exercise, better eating habits, avoid smoking and alcohol, spend time in nature, don’t be so sedentary (at work or at home) yet… we don’t do these things. The list goes on. 😕 what is considered acceptable may always fluctuate. Note that I said “considered acceptable “ Every culture turns a blind eye to something- many things.
These days I think voting Republican is the worst danger to everyone’s health.
Great last line.
It's not a "cult", it's an addiction. I'm a former smoker myself (33 years clean next month!!), and have dear friends who still smoke. Quitting is very hard and not a matter of just knowing what tobacco can do to you. I share your sadness that we still tolerate it as a society.