Cigarette Smoking Then and Now

I hated Boys High school. After seventy-six years, I still have extreme aversion toward some persons of that institution: H. O. Smith, Mr. Floyd and Shorty Doyle, my cowardly history teacher. Doyle never actually wielded the paddle, but he instigated and enjoyed its use in our home-room class. He merely assigned its use to members of teams he coached. I still remember his obscene croaking amusement at the humiliation and pain of the boy being paddled strictly for the enjoyment of the brutish teacher.
Our history class met immediately after recess and Doyle often arrived just in time to dismiss us—scolding us for our disarray: “Why weren’t you studying” he would say.
During recess some boys went beyond the farthest of a series of portable buildings to smoke. Mister Birdsong (I've forgotten his real name), a math teacher whose mission in life was to catch boys at their nefarious lunch-break pastime, tried to sneak up on them but was never successful. He occasionally chased a boy in the street but never caught anyone; he just made himself ridiculous. He was fiftyish, short, bald and paunchy. The smokers had many eyes and misbehaving boys were never for a moment in danger of being caught.
Those boys of 1930, like their opposites today, were given to dangerous conduct. They smoked cigarettes for the cool of it while designating them “coffin nails” in casual conversation. That would tend to indicate a sophisticated understanding of the result of long term use of tobacco. Still, just as do kids today, they indulged in that most stupid of all human exercises: smoking unless you include WAR. Thank God, I, a more perfect individual, never fell into that morass. Of course I lie. I smoked for over twenty years. Furthermore, my relationship with tobacco was a living horror—smoking made me sick. I was allergic to the filthy weed. When I became a seaman in 1935 I bought cigarettes from the ship’s slop chest for six or eight cents per pack. All of us bought cigarettes by the carton—still, I was always trying to stop. As the gnawing need to smoke grew in me, I became nervous and needed one more smoke in my struggle to quit. I bummed a cig for a last smoke. One by one, the crew turned on me like snakes. “Here,” they would say, “take the G. D. pack and go to blazes.” It hurt my pride, but I cadged another cig and my habit continued. Later, when my lingering vice made me miserable, I turned, like a sneak thief, to robbing ash trays or pleading for “a last draw.” It was not a pretty picture.
In 1956, I stopped cold turkey, but the temptation to play with fire remained in my veins. Rarely, I would stop in a bar with a friend, bum a cig and light up while bragging about how I had stopped. I never did anything so absurd and immature. A fool, they say, needs a leg up from the gods. I can only say the fates were kind to this fool. I’m still smoke free.

Part Two
Smoking Smoking; Fromm (Institute) Here To Cig Hell
The boy or girl who smokes, riling Mom and Dad, is saying: “I am flaunting my individuality. Accept it or get lost!! In rebellion against the parental restrictions of childhood, I hereby take revenge.—ON ME!” Wise parents acknowledge coming majority mildly, realizing that not to do so would bring on big trouble.
In my early days at Fromm I observed a contemptuous but silent response to an unwelcome lecture made to a USF student by an antediluvian Frommie.
The codger lectured a young male smoker near the entrance to McLaren Hall. That happened four years ago: On a Wednesday, I came to hear the medical lecture As I approached McLaren, there was a student, at his ease, leaning against the building. He was relaxed—exaggeratedly so—and smoking. In front of him at a distance of four or five feet there was an agitated gentleman of seventy or more years.
I became aware of that disparate duo because an edgy-voiced lecture was going on there;—someone giving out good advice in a public forum. The young recipient was unmoved and continued smoking.
“Take my advice,” the old gentleman said, “you’re ruining your health and wasting your money.” The message, although forceful and delivered with great strength and sincerity, elicited no response thus convincing the deliverer, since it had gone unheard and unheeded, it needed to be repeated. Raising the tone a notch, he continued.
My attention strayed to the lecturee who remained cool as the same message was redelivered, with more emotion, in identical words. As I passed nearer, I caught the boy’s eye and he shrugged ever so lightly in mild ennui.
I have tons of advice, but with that lesson in mind I plan to donate my wisdom with extreme caution. The question is: "Can I resist the temptation?"
I continue, My notes:
This from Comedy Central: “I just come from Alabama where it was 98 degrees at 3 o’clock in the mawning. Alabama must got their own sun.”
***
Now this gem: On her nuptial night, the bride took a bottle of catsup to bed with her. In the morning, the bridegroom inspected the bedsheet to assure himself of the purity of his wife when by unfortuitous accident, the bottle of catsup fell to the floor.
“What’s that dear” the recent lover uttered in surprise.”
“After sex, sweety, I knew you would want a snack, so I’m preparing frankfurters.”
Have a nice Day