Getting a bum rap

Dear editor:
I would like to comment on the furor that is being raised in the district regarding the smoking/non-smoking debate. I also would like to add a few comments about my own battle with the so-called “devil weed.”
I guess I started smoking at about the age of 12 or 13, and I quickly went on to become an inveterate smoker for many, many years after that! I am now pushing 80, so you see I can speak from long experience.
I did a lot of my smoking in my adult years at the lower end of the price range. I remember talking just a few days ago to some of my contemporaries about some of the shenanigans we went through during the depression years. “Picking up butts” was a favourite among many of us as all you needed was a busy sidewalk , a book of cigarette papers, and a match and you were in business.
Of course, we mustn’t forget the old tradition of stealing from Gramp’s pipe tobacco and trying to roll a cigarette with it. Also the Bull Durham in the little cloth sack with papers attached (try rolling one of those in a breeze!)
When I joined the army during World War II, it became ever easier to smoke because with all the incentives provided by the tobacco companies (i.e., packages of 900 cigarettes delivered to your address overseas for $3 meant that your loved ones could keep you well supplied at a minimal cost).
Once you had to use pack rations, it became even easier as every ration pack had its supply of cigarettes—ranging from the packet of five in the American K ration to the cans of 50 in the large British ration boxes.
And so it went.
After World War II, those people who remained in the forces or joined up post-war found that messes and canteens always carried cigarettes as a staple from which no profit was expected to be made so that the price was always,lower than in “Civvy Street.”
I was given the great eye-opener when I was stationed in Germany with NATO in 1957. I was told by a dentist and a doctor that I had pre-cancerous lesions on the roof of my mouth and that I had better stop smoking immediately.
Of course, that thunderbolt stopped me in my tracks! But did I stop forever? Not likely. As soon as I had received some rather drastic treatment (which I will not bother to go in to here) and after I was all healed up, I, like a bloody fool, started again—several times as I can recall.
I finally had my last cigarette in 1979 and, luckily, have never had the urge since. I have, nevertheless, become that insufferable type of person who can’t stand to see anyone smoking. Seriously, I have had a couple of bouts of pneumonia, which has resulted in a much reduced lung capacity, and I choke up at the first whiff of cigarette smoke in a room!
I feel for all the smokers and know how hard it is to quit. I feel, though, that Dr. Sarsfield is getting a bum rap because I am sure, in his heart, he doesn’t give a darn who smokes as long as the people who are forced to inhale second-hand smoke due to their employment get a fair shake.
I have heard and read all the pros and cons about freedom of choice, etc., but tell that to the entertainment industry employees whose very living depends on the whims of their employers.
Anyway, I hope it all turns out for the better and I applaud those employers who have placed the health of their staff over personal gain—however hard that decision has been to make.
And I hope the other employers in the district will find a way out of their dilemma.
Signed,
G.W. Woollard
Emo, Ont.