Smoking

When you don’t think many things have changed, you find a subject that declares you are part of history now.

Growing up in Richmond, it was tobacco city. The smell of tobacco was in the air. Cigarettes were part of everyday culture. Smoking was not only acceptable but also fashionable.

Movie stars smoked. To be sociable, you offered another person a cigarette. There was a whole ritual of carrying a pack and to light a ladies’ cigarette with your Zippo lighter was a good come on line. Soldiers smoked to relieve their tensions and having a smoke after sex was sometimes preferred to pillow talk. The tough guys would always have a cigarette hanging on their lip. Clubs were full of smoke. Offices were full of smoke. Factories were full of smoke. No one took a smoke break; they just lit up.

I started to smoke in junior school. It was a cool thing to walk around with a pack rolled up in your sleeve. I wasn’t too fond of it and it made me cough but all the kids were doing it. Even with the filters, it was rough token. Menthol was coming out about that time and I tried that but it was like sissy candy. Those cowboys that rolled their own didn’t have no menthol.

My parents smoked. All the parents smoked. All our idols smoked. There were ashtrays all over the place. Every restaurant had a cigarette machine by the door. The fancy ones had a girl come by with a tray around her neck offering cigarettes. Television was filled with the temptation to smoke between commercials to drive the latest automobile.

My dad smoked Camels. They were tobacco rolled non-filter. On certain occasions he’d smoke a cigar, but both were more chewed on than inhaled. My mother was a chain smoker. She always had a cigarette going (sometimes in several rooms) and a cup of coffee. She would light another cigarette while coughing, but it never stopped her. At a certain age, some addictions are not worth fighting. There were burns on the tables and the rugs and how the house didn’t burn down is beyond me.

Since cigarettes didn’t feed my cool and cigars were a bit too rough for me, I decided to try a pipe. People in the movies who smoked a pipe were cool and had an air of intelligence, so I tried that.

A pipe was more about the procedure of packing and lighting and puffing rather than inhaling. There was an art of carrying a bag of tobacco and tampers and stick matches and scrapers and a variety of pipes. Different shapes and contours of pipes appealed to me like knives. There was a certain craftsmanship in a pipe.

Finding a special tobacco blend was also part of the procedure, like picking a fine wine or a fragrance. The pipe showed people what you preferred in woods and design, but the tobacco choice blended into the air they breathe.

Luckily for me, tobacco was still popular and I found a close by tobacco shop whose artisans who taught me the ways of smoking a pipe. I never bought a smoking jacket, but I did buy an abundance of pipes and racks and paraphernalia.

The tobacco I chose was a black Cavendish that when lit smelled like chocolate.

Cavendish Tobacco refers to tobacco that has been heat treated with fire or steam and then subjected to heavy pressure in order to produce a sweet taste with a moist texture. American, Dutch, and Danish varieties involve the addition of flavorings; while British Cavendish, commonly known as unsweetened or unflavored Cavendish brings out the natural sugars in the tobacco through pressure applied during the preparation process. Cavendish tobacco is named after Sir Thomas Cavendish.

The varieties of tobacco leaves most commonly used to create Cavendish tobacco are Virginia, and Burley.

The flavorings include sugar, cherry, maple, honey, licorice, chocolate, coconut, rum, strawberry, vanilla, walnut and bourbon.

The preparation of Cavendish tobacco begins by pressing the tobacco leaves into a cake approximately 2.5 cm (1 in) thick. Then the cake is heated using fire or steam, allowing the tobacco to ferment. After, the fermented cakes are cut into slices and packed into pipes. Finally, flavoring may be added before the leaves are pressed again. English Cavendish uses a dark flue or fire cured Virginia, which is steamed and then stored under pressure to allow it to cure and ferment for several days or weeks.

One day my wife asked me to stop smoking. No particular reason or problem, but just asked me. I quit.

Smoking was a habit, not an addiction.

Later smoking went from smoking tobacco to smoking some other kind of weed. The procedure and social acceptance in certain circles became not only the norm but also the requirement to ‘fit in’ like our parents saying, “Let me fix you a drink” or “Have a cigarette?” The culture grew with pipes and bongs and a variety of instruments to increase the experience.

Any passion following of cars or cooking or fashion or smoking gives Amazon a catalog of possibilities for a price.

I haven’t missed the smoky bars or the tasteless kisses. I gave all the aged pipes and racks and a sundry away and have not missed it. For the years that I did smoke, the damage has already been done to my lungs. There are no take backs.

Is the air any cleaner? Went downtown to an old tobacco warehouse being converted into a modern condominium refit and the floors and walls reeked of tobacco.

In this town, some things just don’t go away.