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Earliest experiences with cigarettes?

12:37 / 27.04.03

Being a sluggish Late Adopter, I've only just got around to reading Malcolm Gladwell's 'The Tipping Point', and a brilliantly mind-twiddling read it is too. My favourite chapter thus far is the one teasing out the 'language' of smoking.

Coincidentally, I've always been aware that those Barbeloids I've encountered in the flesh seem, on average, more likely to smoke - and smoke more than non-Barbeloids. To this end, I'd like to try one of Gladwell's 'non-scientific' social experiments:

If you smoke, could you try to describe your earliest experiences with cigarettes? Not necessarily your own first cigarette, but your earliest remembered experiences with cigarettes.

12:44 / 27.04.03

My earliest experience with cigarettes was the smell of my Dad's clothes, and his car. The smell of smoke was something I always identified with him as a child. My actual earliest experience of cigarettes as a social tool was being offered one at about age 12. A group of schoolfriends said to me, "You can only play with us if you have a fag." So I said, "Well I won't play then." And went home.

12:45 / 27.04.03

What was your father like? And how did he smoke?

13:13 / 27.04.03

Like? He was a bit of a hedonist, and idealistic I guess, succeeded at everything he did and was extremely determined to get as much out of life as he could. For example he gave up a really highly paid job in business to become a landscape photographer, and was brilliant at it, became really quite well known.

He drank a *lot* of wine (even when he was in hospital the nurses used to chill it in the fridge for him) and he smoked like a chimney. Always did. He had a few giving up attempts - once he managed a year and a half - but interestingly he used to say he felt like he'd lost a friend, actually grieved for the loss of the process of smoking. I think maybe this was because I don't think he ever wanted to give up, he just thought he *should*. And so did everyone else.

13:16 / 27.04.03

Thanks for that, Olulabelle. That's interesting.

Anyone else? I know you Barbeloids love your gaspers...

14:39 / 27.04.03

Mark's parents had this long totally overgrown garden, at the bottom of which was what used to be a chicken shed. We used to play for hours there, catching animals, frogs, insects etc., setting fire to things, making small explosions. We started smoking bracken, tea, twigs and leaves for a while, and then Mark managed to get hold of a packet of 10 Embassy. I remember loving the smell of the unlit cigarettes and the packet. We lit a cigarette and none of us really knew what to do, but eventually I must have taken a deep hit in my lungs that felt horrible. I ran inside and threw up on the hall carpet and got an earful from Mark's mum. I reckon I was about 10 years old at the time, and I didn't have another cigarette for about 7 years.

14:55 / 27.04.03

My fricking aunt insisted on smoking in the house when I was a baby, much to the horror of my non-smoking parents. I had no experiences with cigarettes really except at another aunt's house, being the only person I knew who smoked. No real early memories of it, but later it came to make me feel ill and stifled. When I was 18-21, I spent a lot of time with a friend who smoked dope constantly (literally) and that was much more pleasant. I finally tried a single cigarette at the age of 21, just to see, and hated it completely. Have smoked a few psychoactive drugs since, but, fuck all that for a pile of babboon droppings. Smoking has never had any real impact on my life, except to let me know that I dislike it very much.

14:56 / 27.04.03

Sorry - I missed the bit where you said 'smoke-friendly Barbeloids'. Sorry Ganesh, want me to delete?

15:00 / 27.04.03

And lose "like a pile of baboon droppings"? Don't you dare.

15:14 / 27.04.03

No, Cholister, your account's interesting too - although Gladwell's stuff tends to look at common early experiences of those who do smoke.

H.I.R., was that your first encounter with cigarettes and/or people who smoked?

Cloned Christ on a HoverDonkey

15:37 / 27.04.03

My dad smokes and has always been in the region of 30-40 per day. All through my childhood I remember being staunchly against his habit, which I never really saw any 'point' to. He now says that he knows that smoking is eventually going to kill him, but he'd rather die younger and enjoy himself than put himself through the torment of giving up something he enjoys so much.

I recall when I was about 8, one afternoon when he left a smouldering faggot in the ashtray, then went outside to wash the car, or something. That smoking butt-end irresistably compelled me to go over and have a puff, just to see why the most important person in my life thought it was so good. I coughed for ages afterwards and vowed never to touch a cigarette again in my life.

I never did, until I was 22 and found myself jobless and unable to afford my usual vice, a nice puff on a joint. I didn't realise I was addicted to nicotine until then (I had used tobacco to fill my mainly resin joints) and that's when I started smoking proper. 10 years down the line and I'm smoking in the region of 30-40 cigarettes a day. I know I've got to give up - my baby boy is now 10 months old and I don't want him to grow up with a malodorous, wheezing bad example of a dad. It's fuckin' hard, though. And expensive.

15:38 / 27.04.03

I'm a smoker who doesn't, if you get me - gave up 5 years ago and still miss it terribly. Not all the time, but I do miss the whole business of smoking.

My Mum smoked throughout her pregnancy with me and all through my childhood so smoke has real safety, home and warmth connotations for me. My Mum always told us we mustn't smoke, that she'd kill us if she found out we were smoking - while, helpfully, telling us that 'all the interesting people smoke - when you go to parties, it's always the smokers I want to talk to.' Hmm, well, ok.

Amazingly, despite this it took me till I was 21 before I had my first cigarette. I went fairly fast from one now-and-then to basically falling into my Mum's smoking habits - the first one before breakfast and then a further 20 odd throughout the day.

I gave up when I was turning 30. Well, I gave up lots of times, but the most recent, and lasting, giving-up was at 30! It wasn't easy, but I did really want to stop - I couldn't breathe well, and I was sick of spending all that money. I'm glad I managed it and have to remind myself of how badly I wanted to stop back then.

(Oh, and my Mum gave up 10 years ago and still really misses it. She still doesn't know that I ever did, or at least I've never told her so.)

16:06 / 27.04.03

My first experience with cigarettes was I suppose when friends of my family came to stay and one of the ladies had to go outside every hour or so to smoke. My dad smokes cigars sometimes though so I generally associate the smell of smoke with him.

I was completely against smoking in that annoying preachy way right up untill the september of my fourteenth year when I my parents were in Paris and I came home from school to find my brother with a water-bong set up right in my sitting room with some salvia in the bowl for me. So, because of all these previous experiences the first time I actually smoked a cigarette was not a big deal to me. I was out at a party and someone offered me one so I took it and smoked it. I now only smoke socially but I really do find it a very pleasant thing to do. It's really comforting and relaxing to be sitting with a ciggy inbetween my fingers.

16:33 / 27.04.03

H.I.R., was that your first encounter with cigarettes and/or people who smoked?

No, my parents smoked during my lifetime, but I have absolutely no memory of it, even though my mother did not give up until I was 6. Also other family members and friends of family smoked, but I just don't remember it.

08:31 / 28.04.03

I don't remember many people in my life smoking when I was a kid. One of my grandfathers stopped when I was quite young, not sure if I can actually remember him smoking. The other stopped when I was a teenager, and I remember fighting with my cousins over who got to light his cigarettes. So I probably have a positive association from there.

I remember thinking when quite young that smoking was quite a normal thing that most people did, despite the fact that not many people did in my presence. Both my parents hated it and thought it was pointless (although my dad had apparently smoked very briefly years before I was born), leading half of me to think along those lines. Why would you want to just stand there and breathe something in and out? How do you know when it's time to take another drag? This view was however contradicted by my seemingly ingrained belief that smoking was natural. I clearly remember thinking that the funny bump in the middle of your top lip was there to hold the cigarette! How fucking weird. Especially as you normally put the ciggie in the side of your mouth anyway.

When I actually smoked my first cigarettes, it was always because of the rebellious aspect. I had my first few when I was 10, and always loved the taste and smell of the packet, the unlit fags and the smoke. Over the next 6 years I had the odd one when it was available but again it was just a rebellious thing or a "why not?" thing. I didn't start smoking properly till I was 16, and have done ever since, though I've never been a heavy smoker. In 12 years I've consistently smoked an average of about 3 (some days around 5, some days none) a day. I really enjoy everything to do with smoking (particularly as I smoke roll-ups, which have more of a process that goes along with them), the taste and the smell, and I'm always a sucker (ha!) for smoking propaganda in movies or books or photos of musicians or whoever.

uncle retrospective

08:58 / 28.04.03

Both of my parents smoked when I was young, about 20 Rothmans a day, they both decided to quit when I was about ten and haven’t smoked since.
I’ve never smoked cigarettes but I have been known to smoke rollups when I can’t smoke joints. It’s a real fucker to be addicted to something you don’t like, tobacco not hash.
I’m currently cutting back on my smoking, down from about 20 joints a day to 2-3. One day at a time brothers and sisters.

09:06 / 28.04.03

My grandfather smoked a pipe when I was young, but I doubt that had a huge effect on me as the smell is completely different to cigarette smoke... my father smoked but gave up before I was born, and my aunt smoked but gave up after I was born (by switching from fags to mints, fact fans). I don't remember her smoking, but I do recall my uncle turning up with a huge duty-free packet of Rothmans for her only to find she'd given up.

Lots of people smoked at school but I was too much of a geek to hang out with them until I was about seventeen. Then, when I started going to the pub etc. everyone smoked, and I took it up as well - largely as a way to get over social awkwardness. I think that's why I have such trouble not smoking in pubs, even now that I'm no longer especially socially awkward - it's completely linked in with going-out excitement and fears, and coping with them.

09:10 / 28.04.03

I think my earliest memory is seeing my dad smoking again, he stopped for about 7 years but I remember one summer seeing him smoking outside - really upset me at the time.

Didn't stop me smoking of course, I also started with leaves (Why??)

15:15 / 28.04.03

I think my earliest memory of cigarettes was being about 7 years old and being dispatched by my mum to get them from the local shop; running home with the big white box in my hand. It was regular errand issued more in a bid to get me out from under her feet than anything else, I imagine.
A bit like Spangle, my first drag on a cigarette was out of the sort of childish compulsion you stop getting at a certain age - like the urge to run rather than walk places. My parents both smoked so I think I found it pretty ordinary, but at the same time I'm sure it helf some sort of fascination. Perhaps it was just a mysterious and exotic form of physical consumption that satisfied a desire that food and drink clearly didn't. Maybe it was partly a fire thing: I certainly used to love it when they'd let me strike the match and light their cigarettes.
I think there was definitely an aesthetic component also. I used to find the rippling trail of smoke rising from a still ciggie pretty mesmerising - the spiralling chaos created in an atmosphere of apparent stillness. That's pretty cool to a kiddie.

I've maintained a pretty intense relationship with cigarettes ever since. I adore them, don't want ever to be without them, and feel an instant bond with others who smoke them. It's the only club I'm in.

Tryphena Absent

16:37 / 28.04.03

My mum's friend Nick is the person that I will always associate with smoking. He was about 6'4" and very lanky and camp. Though there were people around more often who also smoked I knew him from birth to the age of about twelve and smoking was just part of who he was. Nick was an out of work actor and was always very stressed and quite annoying. He smoked quite elegantly and dramatically and would whirl the cigarette around in his hand when he spoke. I was attracted to the idea of smoking from an early age I suppose. My parents friends who smoked all worked in TV or the arts and it seemed like a necessary piece of that life. I loved the smell of tobacco when I was younger (I still do most of the time) and would very occasionally see my dad sneak a cigarette at a party. It just seemed like fate really.

16:01 / 29.04.03

When i was 7 and my sister was 17, she took up smoking, and bizzarely, so did my mum because of it. The whole family was in on this, except for dad, coz mum knew he would go insane if he knew (hes a doctor). So i always got the impression it was something you should *really* be ashamed of.
As for my first, I was 14, round the back of the sports centre. Aaah, how, how... well i would say something with good connotations, but i hate smoking with a passion. Dont mind other people doin it, but hate it myself.

17:47 / 29.04.03

My grandmother smoked a lot when I was younger, and so did her sister, who I think still does. But, my earliest memory of people who smoked was in the Beatles movies, especially A Hard Days Night, where they smoked constantly, and I loved the Beatles, and they looked exceptionally cool.

21:57 / 29.04.03

I was about 13 the first time I smoked. I was hanging around with some people who were a couple of years older than me (which is probably why I began at such an early age/ equating smoking with maturity) and since most members of my family were smokers I just never saw the danger.

22:11 / 29.04.03

OK, well I was 9. en route to choir practice would you believe?? Lived on a rough council estate (Leigh Park - anyone know it?) and I blame Roger Palmer and David Simms. Sooo much older and influential at 11. We still sang like Angels but boy, I bet we stank. Used to nick them out of my Mum's 10 pack of Sovereign. Now hands up who remembers them?

22:20 / 29.04.03

This thread has reminded me that, way back in the sixties, we wee kids could buy chocolate cigars and sweetie cigarettes. The cigars were a con because they were flat on one side but the sweetie cigarettes came in what looked like a proper packet of ten fags, opened at the top in the same manner, stiff cardboard packet, and we loved wandering about with pretend cigarettes in our mouths for five minutes or so, white sugary tubes with pretend flaming red ends, until that got boring and we ate them. Wish I'd stuck to the edible kind.

22:44 / 29.04.03

I so agree Xoc. and I'm still spitting the so called 'sugar-paper' out of my mouth to this day!

21:56 / 30.04.03

Going on the kinda looking like fags sweets- I used to do that with candy sticks. Until my parents bought us a box of white chalk to share...i shoulda noticed that my sister was standing next to the blackboard...