THIS MODERN WORLD This is all true

There is nothing like writing an anti-smoking editorial to make a writer who’s trying not to smoke cigarettes want to light up. Everything’s a prompt, even an image of someone smoking—smoking through their tracheotomy hole—can make the lungs feel “itchy.” Abillboard of someone receiving open-heart surgery can launch the smoking urge. You think you’ve quit? Try walking across that bastion of great thought, the University of Nevada, Reno, through the occasional clouds of cigarette smoke—you’ll be patting your pockets for a lighter.

Take it from someone who has fought an addiction to cigarettes for more than 35 years—anything can be a trigger. You know the best cigarette of the day? It’s the first one after an hour of cardio at the gym.

There is nothing logical about addiction. Not for cigarette smoking, not for meth, not for know-it-all pretension.

You know who’s grossed out by those billboards and commercials of open-heart surgery? Non-smokers.

Does anyone in the United States of America believe there are some smokers who don’t know their little habit has the potential—not the guarantee—of causing health problems?

Does anyone really think that the negative reinforcement provided by an image of a blackened lung is going to make a smoker quit smoking? If so, it’s because they’ve never awakened after a night of drinking beer and smoking cigarettes with a mouth that tastes like someone took a shit in it. And then gone out to the deck for that satisfying first smoke of the day.

There is no one who starts smoking because the things taste good. (Except maybe for those clove and other flavored ciggies that the kids favor.) People start smoking because they like the image. People start smoking because

BY TOM TOMORROW

they’ve got a substance addiction issue—like chewing or hookah, or maybe their parents’second-hand smoke snared them. People start smoking because they like the image they project to other people: “I’m a rebel. I have no fear of death. I’m not going to let The Man tell me what I can do to my own body. Smoking is an affirmation of life.”

Think a threat of lung cancer is a deterrent? Smokers make jokes about it: “It’s got a lot better kick with just one lung.”

There are hundreds of thousands of people on the street who did not become addicted on their first cigarette. There are just as many who did. And nobody can look at their family history or in the mirror and know if they’re going to be one of the ones who don’t get addicted for their first 200 smokes. It’s just like with meth or heroin. It may literally be that first bump.

And once you’re hooked, you are hooked til you die. Any ex-smoker—any ex-smoker—in the right circumstances may slip: a little booze, a little stress, a little environmental smoke, an available cigarette. That’s why so many ex-smokers become judgmental toward those who still smoke. It’s a defense mechanism.

For those who do manage to quit smoking, each does it for his or her own reasons. Maybe they’d like to meet their grandchildren. Those disgusting billboards, commercials and warnings only impress the people who haven’t smoked—like children.

Forget putting those commercials on TVafter 10 p.m. They should be showing them with Saturday morning cartoons.

Take it from someone who has fought an addiction to cigarettes for more than 35 years—because writing this anti-smoking editorial makes me want to light up.Ω

by Dennis Myers

Do you trust your food?

Asked at the U.S. Post Office, Virginia and 17th streets

Andrew Oxner Systems engineer

Generally speaking, yes. Of course, it all depends on where I eat. I trust my own food because I shop carefully; I read ingredients and pay attention to what I’m buying. Now, when I eat at a restaurant … I have to be a little more picky. That’s why I like our local organic restaurants.

Kathleen Goicoechea

Rancher

Yes, because I grow it. We have cattle and sheep, and we eat our own beef and lamb. And most of the time we use farmers’markets.

Trevor Cummins

Student

It’s never failed me before. For the most part, I make my own food, so I cook a lot. Don’t eat out a lot.

John Kanipe

Retail sales consultant

Somewhat. Depends on where I get it from, because I’ve gotten food poisoning three times in the last two years. But I think a lot of it has to do with, I go to roach coaches. … That’s a reason why I don’t go to those anymore.

Nicole McCarty

Student

No, because nowadays a lot of the stuff has a lot of the chemicals, and it’s processed. No, I don’t trust it. … I read labels.