MY LIFE WITH AND WITHOUT CIGARETTES

(AND CIGARS AND A PIPE)

The Old Rusty Nail

AN E-JOURNAL FOR OLD PEOPLE

Russell Burton, an Old Person

I write on this subject because I am sure this will bring back memories to my readers when we were young especially those of us who smoked tobacco. And, in those days the majority of men were regular smokers, primarily cigarettes.

I include cigars and a pipe in my title because when I quite smoking tobacco I was smoking all three each day.  I was up to three packs a day, a couple of cigars and my pipe.  I was in my mid thirties so it was sometime in the 1960s when I suddenly one early evening decided to quit and it was cold turkey. 

I started smoking cigarettes when I joined a fraternity house at the University of California at Davis (UCD) in 1950. I was eighteen years of age in my second year of college.  The fraternity was Phi Sigma Kappa a national one with a good reputation which included empathizing good grades and hosting an annual party known as the Tahiti Tussle.  When I lived at home I smoked a pipe occasionally but I did not get hooked on tobacco until later in 1950 when I left home and entered UCD.

In those days, a tobacco representative visited fraternity houses and explained how wonderful their product was especially to young college men.  Lucky Strikes and Camels were the two brands I remember.  At that time, there were no filtered cigarettes. And, at the close of the visit he gave each of us a small pack of 4 cigarettes.  Now in those days a pack of 20 cigarettes cost 17 cents – yes just 17 cents.  Yes a carton of 20 packs was $3.40.

We all knew even back then that smoking was unhealthy.  About that time Edward R. Murrow, the well-known TV news commentator who was a chain smoker, even on TV died of lung cancer at a relatively young age.  And, a popular song then was Smoke, Smoke, Smoke that Cigarette which touted the dangers of smoking. Still, it was common practice to smoke in all buildings including people’s homes.  The only house in which I was not allowed to smoke in was my first wife’s parent’s home.  And, I thought that was most unfriendly.

With three Phi Sig friends in 1954 we rented a two bedroom apartment for our two years remaining in college.  Here, I smoked regularly and my friends did not object even though neither one of them had the habit. And, before I quit cold turkey many years later at Davis, I worked as a scientist at UCD in a small office room which I shared with an engineer and another scientist.  Neither of them smoked but they did not complain for some unknown reason for today as a nonsmoker I would have not tolerated such a thing. 

It is hard to imagine for a younger person to understand how popular smoking cigarettes was back then.  They were advertised everywhere.  Smoking was much more common than not smoking that is if you didn’t smoke something was not quite right. In the movies everybody smoked and on the billboards were very popular Marlboro Men and Joe Camel a cartoon of a smoking camel.  Interestingly, to move fast forward, all of the Marlboro men, depicted as handsome healthy western cowboys died at an early age.  The last one made many TV advertisements depicting the dangers of smoking cigarettes as he was dying of some smoking related disease.

Many years later, I had lunch once a month with that UCD scientist who with me shared that small office and he laughed about me smoking cigarettes, a pipe, and cigars all at the same time!  I guess smoking was so common then that even nonsmokers were use to the smell of burning cigarettes and inhaling that second-hand smoke.  Certainly, not anymore for almost everywhere and in mostly all buildings smoking is banned.

I return back to when I decided to quit the habit that early evening before I had my dinner.  My wife at the time worked for the Davis police, when that evening she told me about an incident which had occurred that day.  A middle-aged man had throat cancer from smoking and had been treated for the disease with radiation.  Unfortunately the radiation had weakened the wall of a major artery in his neck.  This carotid artery ruptured and he bled to death on his front porch in front of his family.

Now, I had heard stories about the evils of smoking before, but this one for some reason hit a chord with me and I said, “This is the stupidest damn habit, I’m going to quit right now!”    

Now I had quit three times before over those many years of my smoking, once for 6 months but for some reason went back to them usually at a Bar having a drink.  But, then for me quitting was not a difficult unpleasant experience.  I guess this is why I started smoking again.  So, I guess when I decided this time I was going to quit I was totally unaware of how difficult it would be.

What was most unusual this time was I quit in the early evening when normally I would smoke another pack of cigarettes before bedtime.  The other times I had quit I did so when I first awoke in the morning.  I never smoked in bed.

So, that day I went to work in my office without cigarettes and I sat staring at my desk without doing anything all day.  For three months, I did the same thing.  During this period of cold turkey quitting I told my boss that I did not know why he was paying me because I was doing nothing.  He had been a smoker and knew what I was going though so he just shook his head smiled and told me to stick with it.

And I did!!!!!!! 

Now here I am 50 years later alive and as a nonsmoker.  Of course had I continued to smoke cigarettes, I would have died many years ago.  My second wife finally quit smoking.  She never smoked in the house so it did not bother me.  She quit cold turkey even though there are several nonsmoking aids available which I suppose help some people.  She had smoked since her late teens, and did not find it difficult to quit.  I have thought about the vast differences between her experience quitting and mine.  Of course it is an individual thing, but one reason I think made the difference was that I was smoking three times more than she was.

Sometimes when I go into a store now and I am following someone who is buying a pack of cigarettes I must wait until the checkout person walks across the room and opens the locked glass container and searches for the brand.  The glass cage is closed and locked and the store employee returns to hand that person the pack of cigarettes. I am always shocked to see the price of that pack of cigarettes show up on the cash register - $6. 

My wife smoked about a pack a day so that translates to about $2200 each year she began saving.  My habit today would have cost some $6600 a year!  Now that is serious money.  Come to think of it, I would be dead now so the high cost of smoking would not really be a problem.

Written 1/15 revised 8/17