Nows and Forevers

I’ve always had a serious dislike of smoking.

It’s not just that it causes cancer, is an expensive and otherwise unhealthy habit, and makes the air unclean for all the nonsmokers like me who are nearby. I hate the smell of smoke on other people, and one time long ago I remember turning away from otherwise attractive woman who liked me because she was a smoker.

Part of it, of course, is the fact that I have asthma and literally can’t be around smoke. But it’s also about how revolting smoking is to me.

I can honestly say I’ve drawn two cigarettes in my entire life, when they were offered to me, as a teenager. And I couldn’t take more than one puff each before handing it back.

Luckily, I’ve rarely been around smokers in my family. My mother and father smoked in the ‘60s when they were young. My mother stopped cold turkey in her first year of college, when she dropped embers into a wastebasket and it caught fire. My father stopped before I was born, although he took it up again briefly when he was dating a smoker and just as quickly gave it up. I think there was something about the withering glare I gave him as a teenager when he tried to explain why he had taken up the habit again.

My stepfather also smoked but quit, instantly, when he found out my mom was pregnant with my sister. That was 40 years ago and he hasn’t faltered.

My grandmother also smoked, but quit when I was a baby. She became the biggest anti-smoking advocate I’ve ever seen. She told me once that there’s no bigger enemy of smoking than an ex-smoker who quit. I was telling that to someone the other day who agreed, because she also had quit decades ago.

Ironically, my grandmother quit smoking 45 years before she was diagnosed with lung cancer. We never did get to the bottom of it, but I’ve worried when I see smokers that they could be risking lung cancer even if they quit long ago.

I don’t know too many smokers now. One of my colleagues, an avid smoker, passed away during the pandemic. I know some neighbors who smoke, because I see their cigarette butts on the street. That’s another thing that I can’t stand about smoking: The cigarette butts. I was walking into a restaurant the other day and I saw about a dozen cigarette butts outside in front of the place. It was not only littering but incredibly unappetizing.

It’s a lot different of a world than when I grew up. In some ways that’s bad, but in other ways, it’s good. Smoking used to be everywhere, and my lungs would be inflamed because of it. I couldn’t go to restaurants, stores or on airplanes without becoming miserable. That’s all gone away now and we can enjoy these places smoke free. It’s a blessing for everyone’s health.

But the butts, well, they sometimes remain.