Chapter 27 - Summer, 1970, Cigarettes

When I have cigarettes I smoke thirty cigarettes a day. I don’t think ahead and hoard cigarettes for when I run out. When I have them, I smoke full out. When I don’t I come to a screeching halt. They you don’t want to be around me. I get sarcastic and mean, my speech clipped and angry. That’s it, I’m angry. I rarely show any anger any other time. Also I feel light-headed and shaky and nervous. I hate being without cigarettes. I don’t know what to do with myself. Time stretches; minutes seem like hours. Someone give a cigarette! My friends do try to keep me in cigarettes because they don’t really like this me as much as the anesthetized version.

I have a cigarette as soon as I wake up. Still in my nightgown, I turn on the Today Show. I light up another cigarette in the bathroom, put it out while I shower. With my wet hair wrapped in a towel I relight the cigarette and inspect my face in the mirror. I deal with any irregularities there and head downstairs to the kitchen. I don’t need to carry the ashtray. I have a new one on each level. I light a new cigarette as I put on the water for instant coffee. I drink it black, a remnant of the vending machine my first year of teaching, the black coffee being the only drinkable choice. I move over to the tiny kitchen table where there is, of course, another ashtray and eat my breakfast, usually just toast. I don’t smoke while I eat, but as soon as I am done I light another one. I put my dishes in the sink and head back upstairs, back to the bathroom with my coffee. I smoke 3 cigarettes while I dry and style my hair and another while I put on my very light makeup.

My one splurge has always been Elizabeth Arden moisturizer because my skin likes it best. It’s very pricey but I still have some left. I usually ask for it for Christmas which I still spend with Augusta and Hobart, et al. Now I have two Christmases because I have another with my friends. That’s the extent of my “toilette” for the day. I’m still in my nightgown as I head into the living room. I light my next cigarette as spend a few minutes with the Today show, just enough to hear the news of the day. I have a little dresser now in the living room so I paw through the drawers picking out the outfit of the day. Perhaps some baggy shorts and a short-sleeved blouse. I’m already wearing sandals with my nightgown. I light another cigarette before I head back to the bathroom to get dressed. There is a new Vogue in the living room waiting for me. I love Vogue, it’s not really like fashion, it’s like art. I light a new cigarette and it sits in the ashtray smoking while I turn my bed back into a couch. I spend a long time with Vogue. I don’t just look at it; I read it. I smoke three more cigarettes while I do this.

There’s no one else home right now so I have the place to myself. I need to go to the store. I need a new pack of cigarettes and we need a few groceries. Lena has left me some money. After I lock the front door, I light a cigarette before I leave the front porch. The grocery store is only a block away, a long block. I mostly hold the lit cigarette down at my side. I don’t really like strangers on the street to see me actually puffing it. I think it’s really not right to smoke on the street. When there’s no one around, I take a puff and blow the smoke out impatiently. Some people like to watch their smoke and play with it. I’ve done it. There is pleasure in it, but for me the pleasure is pretty much oral. I put the cigarette out before I go in the store. When I come out with my groceries I light up again.

Time for lunch. Repeat of breakfast. Light up, prepare lunch, eat lunch, have an after lunch ciggie. Dishes are added to the pile. If it isn’t a laundry day, which involves a trip down the street in the opposite direction from the grocery store, then it’s soap opera time. I watch two so that’s two hours, about four smokes. The telephone rings. I light up and talk to Mom. She says, “You’re smoking aren’t you?” She can hear me exhale.

The guys stop by. Lena and Linda come home. I’m still on the couch watching TV. We chat; we commune through the music, the words of it, the complexity of it, the familiarity of it. Our favorite albums right now are King Crimson and Déjà Vu (Crosby Stills, Nash, and Young). “Our House” is our very favorite song. We all sing the words either out loud or in our head, “is a very, very, very fine house.” I have five cigarettes while we do this.

Time for dinner. I make macaroni and cheese, there’s a veggie, white bread, lemonade, no dessert. I smoke while I set out the plates. We can’t eat at the table. We just fill a plate and eat where we want. After dinner I light up again. It’s pretty smoky in here by now, because some of the guys smoke too. I collect all the dishes; fill the dishpan with detergent and water. My cigarette is right next to me burning down to ashes, but if I try to smoke it now it will get all wet and disintegrate. If I want a puff I have to dry my hands first. I pile all the dishes into the drainer; cover them with a dishtowel. I let them air dry.

I put on long pants because we have tickets to hear the Moody Blues at the university. I light up one last cigarette before we go in – you can’t smoke at this concert. Someone has made hash brownies and is passing them around. There are enough for us so we each eat one. The hash is so strong that the walls of the auditorium change color.Someone else passes around giant cucumbers. It’s a double entendre. Everyone gets the joke. “Must have big one.” The band comes on and they’re wonderful. We all get very mellow.

As soon as I leave the concert I light up, but I have to put it out when I get in the car. We go home, open some beers, light up some jays and sprawl out on my couch-bed. At around 2 am we are finally all crashed or gone home. That is five cigarettes later. Oh, oh, today I went over. I smoked thirty-two. The next day I get up and do it all over again
for the next forty years, although I eventually get down to one pack a day.