Up In Smoke

An old friend of mine was recently visiting from the states. We went into Brighton centre one night to drink whiskey, catch up and judge young people on their fashion choices. After our first round he asked if I had a cigarette. The last time we'd actually hung out was 2003, when we were both 21 and living in Seville.

At the time I typically had one hanging from my mouth, removed only periodically and then swiftly replaced with the head of a beer bottle, a joint, another cigarette or some lomo. Alas, I told him, I'd quit smoking in 2005 when, whilst travelling the world with severe abdominal pains an Australian doctor had put a camera up my bottom and declared I had Crohn's, a not-particularly-sexy disease exacerbated by smoking. And they called that place Surfer's “Paradise” ?!

Anyway, that year I'd quit (just the cigarettes...) with extreme prejudice and never looked back, so we ducked out of the pub and I squired him to a local newsagent to buy a pack. As the cashier reached into the secret shame cupboard behind the till I whispered to my buddy to clench for a shock, thinking he wouldn't get much change from the £10 note in his hand, but it was jaws to the floor when the call came back for £17.99! (it's 18 really isn't it?) EIGHT-TEEEEN pounds??!! Not for a house or a car or even just a big telly, but a little cardboard box with 20 thin rolls of paper inside containing a few crushed leaves. I made an involuntary noise of horrified amazement, somewhere between a snort and a scoff and a laugh. I imagine I looked and sounded quite punchable. Luckily the shopkeeper nodded instead, eyebrows raised high in tacit understanding of this dystopian nightmare we found ourselves in. Similarly incredulous, but coming from a country where all school kids are now expected to routinely dodge bullets and a bloated orange sociopathic criminal is odds on for a second stint in the White House, my American friend swallowed his indignation and reached back in his wallet for the balance.

Back at the pub I almost had one to see if they were somehow seven times tastier than the packs of Bensons I paid £2.60 for when I started dabbling at 13 but I stuck instead to my single malt vice while my friend stood outside in the rain questioning his life choices. When two young people approached and politely asked him if they could each “bum a straight” - a highly ambiguous phrase in Brighton – they were essentially asking him to cough up £1.80.

The reality is far from being angry at the price of a pack, on reflection I was actually pleasantly surprised (clearly enough to make that weird noise) in that hypocritically pious ex-smoker way. Issues of personal choice are complex and whilst I've wilfully indulged in my fair share of hedonistic pursuits, ultimately ciggies are bad news: For the health of the smokers and those around them – children and babies included. For the look of our public spaces, streets littered with discarded butts, city bins scorched and melted. For the heavy burden they put on the NHS and the astronomical costs to taxpayers, and for the poor, sensitive noses of non smokers. I know the reason to this day I'm crap at Geography is an abject fear of asking questions in school, lest the otherwise kindly Mr. Numan approached my desk to melt my face with his coffee and ciggie death-breath. In a world without cigarettes, I'd probably know where Belarus is...
Long before GCSE Geography, smoking attained a glamorous appeal through its mainstream depiction, with ash-tapping stars such as Humphrey Bogart, James Dean and Audrey Hepburn doubling down on the exotic allure invested in tobacco when intrepid explorers first began bringing it back from far flung corners of the Earth. John Wayne and the Marlboro Man lent their rugged masculinity and sense of individualism to the pursuit whilst Marilyn Monroe and Lauren Bacall oozed sensuality from the tops of their heads to the tips of their stinky, yellowed fingertips. Young boys and girls have been sparking up ever since in an effort to look cool, though it's far cooler these days if it lights up and plays Rita Ora, the rise of the vape both heralded as a safer, less obnoxious alternative to traditional tobacco, and decried as an insidiously sweet tasting siren-call to a generation still finding their feet (typically on a scooter). After all, nicotine provides temporary stress-reduction and God knows there's enough stress in the world, the cost of fags not withstanding. Whilst the long-term effects of honking on aerosol daily are not yet known (though unlikely to be beneficial), for now vaping appears to be the methodone to the madness.

Smoking is generally on the decline as more people understand the risks, advertising has been all-but eradicated and newsagents force you to sell an already blackened lung to afford your next pack. The UK government recently revealed plans to further nail that coffin, aiming to ban disposable vapes and likely raising the legal age to purchase tobacco by one year each year. If this plan is implemented by 2027 it means anyone currently 14 or younger will never legally be able to buy a cigarette. England, Scotland and Wales all aim to be “smoke free” (adult smoking rates at or below 5%) in the next decade.

Of course there will be pockets of resistance, black-market baccy and social outliers roaming the hinterlands of the high street, puffing away defiantly and snarling at horrified children and little old ladies, but perhaps one day we'll look back at smoking as nothing more than a crazy, costly, dangerous blip in our evolution.....

Just don't take away alcohol.