I rolled eight cigarettes in my 10 o'clock economics class. As my professor babbled on about bar graphs (and misused "facile" for which I sic'd her in my notes), my attention was lost in a swirl of rich smoke. I roamed in flavor country, oblivious to all else.
But my cigarettes (Camel Lights of late) were miles away in my house off-campus, a hopeless, wishful attempt at a day of abstinence. How moralistic we are when we've woken in the early morning and have taken time to compile to-do lists! But I forgot to register for sports, spent too much time on e-mail so that I had to drive onto campus instead of walking, and left dirty dishes in the sink, but still I remembered to forget my cigarettes: how cruel.
I groped about in my bag for a forgotten, welcome stale pack from before active memory, say last week or the week before. None. But in another pocket and from just last week a nearly-full pouch of Drum premium rolling tobacco and a packet of their too-thick but who cares at this point rolling papers. Saved; I was saved. And in the back row of a Rockefeller classroom, where the professor can, if she wishes to, see a student's every movement, I plucked and pinched and moistened and folded as the students beside me dutifuly noted the locations of several menu commands in Microsoft Excel. Salivating; I was salivating. And antsy, as the period crept toward its conclusion to which the professor seemed oblivious until -- no warning, no rushing, no change in tone, no cue at all -- she stopped.
I ran.
Cigarette in hand (others in the Drum's pouch), I scanned for fire: est-ce que vous avez du feu? Outside of the Rockefeller Center, students chatted and giggled and walked side by side and tore across the grass on bicycles and marched stiff-legged and occupied unoccupied hands with hair and clothing and clothing accessories. None smoked. Sure, a Boy Scout or a Girl Scout might have a lighter or a pack of matches (always be prepared) or maybe even a Don or Donella Juan (ditto), but of the mass in fleece and Gap and blue jeans or khakis and Abercrombie T-shirts, who? Which one?
I panicked across the street to Baker where students manipulated bike locks and one young tank-topped lady with painted face fingered a lolly lodged between Old Glory red lips. I skirted Bakerberrysandborn and ran into the two construction workers on campus who do not smoke. "No, not me," said one. "Maybe ask Bill over there." Bill is also a nonsmoker.
Taunting spent butts littered the ground; my heart raced and brow dampened; twitched, my right fist twitched around its treasure. No one in sight smoked, no one.
The proper time to smoke is in one's late teens and early 20s. At first, it's rebellious: parents, teachers, B-list celebrities admonish it along with drinking, drug-using, sex, and all other just-out-of-reach pleasures. Friends and I crept off our high school's campus regularly to sneak smokes in the woods, behind sheds, or in public parks (twitching with anxiety). It was great fun.
As one ages, cigarettes, though no longer taboo, retain their value; the "we're all in this together" mentality of the forbidden is replaced with camaraderie amongst those who have otherwise nothing in common. For nonsmokers: ever seen one of those beer commercials where some slob at a bar orders a certain brand of brew and the place goes from sedate to hopping and the guy ends up hitting on two or three very-interested and bouncing bombshells? When a sizable minority of a population smokes, it's like that, except the conversations are either more banal ("I used to smoke Reds when I was in the sixth grade.") or esoterically intellectual ("Have you ever considered that sarcasm, in writing though more so in speech, may be the enemy of semantic precision?"). Smoking provides a ready-made social setting, especially outside smoke-free buildings. Note also that smokers are a very diverse lot, however one cares to define diversity.
But that's not all. Smoking is an excellent study break and a harmless procrastination. It makes trips across campus shorter and more pleasant (a "10 minute walk" becomes "two cigarettes"). It engages limbs that would otherwise have to be awkwardly occupied. Smoking can be an excuse ("I'd love to talk now, but I really need to go out and have a cigarette") or a bond ("Come outside and have a cigarette with me").
Recent research indicates that nicotine may function similarly to antidepressants. Whether that's true or not, the drug certainly is a mild stimulant and does improve focus.
And, why not: pulling sweet smoke into one's lungs and savoring it and then exhaling is enjoyable in itself, damn all else.
There's no good reason not to have one right now.
Maybe this year's freshmen are bashful; maybe it was too cold outside; maybe I just hit a spectacular string of coincidences and hundreds of people -- students, faculty, administrators, visitors, Hanover High truants -- were lighting up behind me as I crossed campus. But it seems that fewer and fewer students are enjoying the pleasures (newly legal for many freshmen) of a Camel, or a Marlboro, or -- why not? -- a Nat Sherman Natural, or a Dunhill.
So, in all seriousness, go on, light up; I'll smoke one with you, and we'll discuss the politics of the day or our classes this term or that young lady with painted face. Smoking in college is an opportunity of which students should be aware and that they should consider before dismissing thoughtlessly. And, in any case, make sure you've got a lighter on hand. I left mine at home.
