An ex-smoker’s
thoughts on the occasion of World No Smoking Day 2013 (May 31)
It’s funny, I never thought of World No Smoking Day when I was a smoker – and I thought even less about it after I stopped smoking, nearly three years ago.
But I decided that I
need to write something this year, for May 31, as a wake-up call to the
millions of smokers out there who are still, well, asleep, as it were.
As always, I’ll lay
out my argument like a shopping list of points, in no particular order of
priority. You can pick the ones you like (or dislike, depending on where you’re
coming from). And you can make up your own mind:
1. Money
Smoking is a very expensive habit. At one time, the amount I spent on a day on the stuff would have paid my cable TV bill for a month. The amount I spent over 26 years of smoking, was more than the cost of the car I bought when I quit !
And the cost always goes up. Internationally. Governments keep increasing taxes on tobacco, since no one’s going to vote them out of power for that ! And there’s an indirect cost, too – local laws cause the shops to be shifted further and further away from you, so there may actually be a cost involved in getting to the point of purchase of the cigarettes !!
No one’s saying you can’t afford it. But money, by definition, is a thing that is always in short supply. If you have too much of it, you might want to find something better to do with it.
Smoking is a very expensive habit. At one time, the amount I spent on a day on the stuff would have paid my cable TV bill for a month. The amount I spent over 26 years of smoking, was more than the cost of the car I bought when I quit !
And the cost always goes up. Internationally. Governments keep increasing taxes on tobacco, since no one’s going to vote them out of power for that ! And there’s an indirect cost, too – local laws cause the shops to be shifted further and further away from you, so there may actually be a cost involved in getting to the point of purchase of the cigarettes !!
No one’s saying you can’t afford it. But money, by definition, is a thing that is always in short supply. If you have too much of it, you might want to find something better to do with it.
2. TimeAre you a watch-the-clock person ? There are lots of interesting sides to the time “value” of smoking.
One unconfirmed, quasi-medical report suggests that every cigarette takes away 6 minutes of your life….go figure !
Closer to home, your boss is likely to tell you that you’re working 60 minutes a day less, as a result of smoking 10 cigarettes. Why ? Because these days, thanks to cigarette bans, you not only have to leave the office, or the building, or the compound – you actually have to leave the campus altogether.
Then, of course, there’s the time taken (see above) to buy the cigarettes.
3.
Smoke
& Ash
No, this point isn’t about small volcanic
eruptions. Haven’t you heard that
kissing a smoker is like licking an
ashtray ? I’ve actually licked an ashtray, albeit briefly. Not nice.
As a smoker, you will move in the centre of a small, almost invisible, environment of ash. It will be everywhere – on your table, in the corners of your drawers, in your laptop keyboard (turn it over, tap the back, and see), in your shirt pockets, in every nook and cranny of your car, in the corners of your sofa, all over your carpet……..the list is endless.
ashtray ? I’ve actually licked an ashtray, albeit briefly. Not nice.
As a smoker, you will move in the centre of a small, almost invisible, environment of ash. It will be everywhere – on your table, in the corners of your drawers, in your laptop keyboard (turn it over, tap the back, and see), in your shirt pockets, in every nook and cranny of your car, in the corners of your sofa, all over your carpet……..the list is endless.
.
4. Appearance
Over a period of time, a smoker’s appearance changes quite startlingly. Lips become dark brown, and could even become black. Fingers of the smoking hand become visibly yellower than those of the other hand. Facial skin becomes dry and desiccated, and begins to age, crease and wrinkle a few years earlier than it ordinarily would. Teeth become yellow, and tobacco deposits form on the inside. Gums become darker, like the lips.
A lot of these changes are irreversible. Yes, you can spend a fortune at the dentist’s, but you’ll have to keep going back. And Garnier hasn’t come up with a Smoker’s Skin Cream yet.
Over a period of time, a smoker’s appearance changes quite startlingly. Lips become dark brown, and could even become black. Fingers of the smoking hand become visibly yellower than those of the other hand. Facial skin becomes dry and desiccated, and begins to age, crease and wrinkle a few years earlier than it ordinarily would. Teeth become yellow, and tobacco deposits form on the inside. Gums become darker, like the lips.
A lot of these changes are irreversible. Yes, you can spend a fortune at the dentist’s, but you’ll have to keep going back. And Garnier hasn’t come up with a Smoker’s Skin Cream yet.
5.
The Sounds
of Smoking
After the first decade or so, a heavy smoker’s breathing begins to get laboured – in very silent surroundings, or over a clear telephone line, you can actually hear a smoker breathe. It gets worse after twenty years, and it worsens further after physical activity.
Singing smokers will eventually have to give up most of the songs they love, because they will not be able to hit the high notes or the very low ones. It’s a terrible reality check to have your voice crack at a pitch you could always sing in, and then try and figure out how it happened without your being aware of it.
Smokers who love laughter will have to start their laughs from higher up – if it really comes from the belly, they may find their laughs turning into a paroxysm of coughing as they choke on the ever-present trapped smoke in their lungs.
Phlegm accumulates rapidly in a smoker’s system, bringing with it the “smoker’s cough”, which varies between a dry, hacking cough that can frequently be painful, and a gurgling “wet” phlegmatic gurgle that will cause people to hurriedly move a little further away. It’s embarrassing; and it never feels nice, particularly in the morning, and late at night.
After the first decade or so, a heavy smoker’s breathing begins to get laboured – in very silent surroundings, or over a clear telephone line, you can actually hear a smoker breathe. It gets worse after twenty years, and it worsens further after physical activity.
Singing smokers will eventually have to give up most of the songs they love, because they will not be able to hit the high notes or the very low ones. It’s a terrible reality check to have your voice crack at a pitch you could always sing in, and then try and figure out how it happened without your being aware of it.
Smokers who love laughter will have to start their laughs from higher up – if it really comes from the belly, they may find their laughs turning into a paroxysm of coughing as they choke on the ever-present trapped smoke in their lungs.
Phlegm accumulates rapidly in a smoker’s system, bringing with it the “smoker’s cough”, which varies between a dry, hacking cough that can frequently be painful, and a gurgling “wet” phlegmatic gurgle that will cause people to hurriedly move a little further away. It’s embarrassing; and it never feels nice, particularly in the morning, and late at night.
6.
Taboo
You will find that smoking is so socially unacceptable these days, that to indulge in it is a serious problem. Laws have been enacted to make smoking in certain places illegal; smoking areas are so demarcated that the people there feel isolated even if they do not want to. Most homes are smoke-free these days, making it difficult to smoke with comfort anywhere. It’s simply not worth the trouble any more.
You will find that smoking is so socially unacceptable these days, that to indulge in it is a serious problem. Laws have been enacted to make smoking in certain places illegal; smoking areas are so demarcated that the people there feel isolated even if they do not want to. Most homes are smoke-free these days, making it difficult to smoke with comfort anywhere. It’s simply not worth the trouble any more.
7.
HealthYou think this should have gone first ? Oh, no. Everyone knows smoking isn’t a healthy practice, but that hasn’t stopped millions from indulging in it. The idea here is to point out that smoking is also bad for your health.
And this is given a situation where you don’t necessarily have to die from smoking. Here’s what it can do to you before that:
- It kills your stamina, so that you can’t walk, run, climb, cycle or swim like you used to.
- It destroys the fine hairs, called cilia, on your lungs, so that your lungs lose the ability to expel foreign suspended particulate matter in the air you breathe – which means that you’re quite capable of choking on that very air.
- It weakens the elasticity of your lungs, so that you have to work twice as hard to breathe the same air. This means that your heart has to work twice as hard to pump the same blood. This also means that if you have to get into an operating theatre and attach yourself to a ventilator, you may have trouble getting the ventilator off.
And then if you smoke long enough to have one or all of these issues, and then decide to stop smoking, recovery is a lengthy process, and even then, is rarely more than 50%.
Endnote
So now you have the picture, a black-and-white eyewitness account, from a former smoker. There’s only one question left to answer:
If you’re eventually not going to look good, sound good, feel good or be considered as good, then why do it ?
While you chew upon that - Happy World No-Smoking Day !
