by Anthony Megna

Created on: September 01, 2008   Last Updated: January 12, 2010

The question is, does anybody buy cigarettes anymore?

No, everybody steals them. What kind of question is this? Do cigarettes drop from the sky? Do foreign countries send them to us? Do we grow them in our backyard?

I smoked my first "thinkstick" when I was about 5 years old. Of course, it was my fathers Camel butt I found in the ashtray, and it really didn't bother me much. You see, I wanted to be just like my Dad. Everything he did, I admired. It didn't matter back then what it was. He had a bit of a potbelly, and I wanted one. He smoked, and I wanted to as well. He was my hero. As far as smoking consistently, that didn't happen until I was in high school. It was fun going against the grain and smoking in the boys room at school. It was an adventure. The camaraderie we had was priceless. That is what cigarettes were for. At least for me. Also, we all thought we were cool, and we were.

Cigarettes were all over the big screen. What would Bogart look like without a butt hanging out of his mouth? It was part of his persona. What about the war heroes you see pictures of? We would have lost World War 2 without cigarettes. It was the needed lift the soldiers required to go into battle. It was the relaxation mandatory after battle. Cigarettes broke the ice when meeting other soldiers.

Nobody worried too much about the cost back then. Even in the sixties they were about a quarter a pack. Then in time came the medical news. Everyone worried they were going to get cancer. The cost of smokes kept creeping up. Political correctness, that dreaded phrase, became part of the English lexicon. The fun of smoking was on the way out.

I still smoke. I don't care about the cost. I guess I am yearning for the good old days. I had lunch the other day with a 96 year old women who is as sharp as a tack. She wanted to go out of the nursing home and have a smoke. Would I join her, she asked? You bet I will.

While most of the other patients were suffering in their beds, many who have never smoked in their lives, she was out with me sneaking a smoke and talking up a storm. She has life to her. She is funny and a bit of a rebel. She is my type of women! I asked her what the doctor told her about her smoking, she replied the doctor said, "keep doing what your doing". That is my type of doctor. He can see the reality of the situation. As far as I am concerned, when you reach that age, you can shoot up heroin for all I care.

Although they make a big deal about deaths caused by smoking, one has a higher chance of being killed in a car accident than dying by smoking. People should be able to be free to choose how they want to live their lives without any interference unless they are harming someone else. And all this talk about second-hand smoke? Poppycock. Both sides of my family have been around cigar and cigarette smoke all their lives and have lived into their 80's and beyond. My grandmother died at the age of 99.

Does anybody buy cigarettes anymore? Yeah, the lively ones do...

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