Up In Smoke

So, I have to ask - why are people still smoking?

It's 17 degrees out there right now.  Looking out the bow windows onto Doctor's Row I see at least three people - one of them a housemate from upstairs - desperately puffing away against the snowbanks and wind.

I suppose it's a genuine addiction.  There are things I am compulsive about - genuine addictions, no. (well, maybe to writing - we'll see).

Perhaps it's the cold weather.  I walk along Congress Street to the library (downtown) or to the Fresh Approach Grocery (uptown) and I pass people on the sidewalks, smell smoke and look at clouds in the air, clouds of breath and cigarette smoke.

Perhaps it's a way to keep warm.  Of course, if they didn't have to go outside in 17 degree weather to smoke they may not need to light up in order to stand the cold of going outside to light up.

I could be over-thinking this, too.

When I was very young - say first grade - I stole cigarettes from my mother's purse, and matches.  Taking my ill-gotten booty to the other side of the hedge to the curbside I lit up and tried to smoke like my parents did.

Needless to say my body was wracked with a hacking, explosive coughing fit.  I remember getting dizzy and sick, feeling I'd throw up in a few more seconds.

This was nothing compared to the shock of feeling long fingernails digging deep into my shoulder, backed up by the incredible strength of a hand grown strong from long hours of scrubbing floors and washing dishes.  This irresistible force pulled me through the hedge, tossed me to the ground.

I then was kicked - kicked like a sinning soccer ball - all the way into the house, my mother yelling at me half in English, half in Cherokee - and to this day I couldn't tell you which one was scarier.

Correction like that makes a lasting impression on a kid.

Needless to say I never smoked tobacco again - though I do burn it as an offering at powwows.

Of course, it can also be said, to my parent's credit, that they were never seen smoking again, from that day onwards.

Love makes people do strange things.