Tobacco: American. Dead American.

Have we ever had an issue at hand as convoluted and controversial as tobacco? Is tobacco American? I think the answer is absolutely, yes. Native Americans were using it long before this country was settled by Europeans. Before tobacco was popularized as a recreational drug, Native Americans used it as an enthogen…hey-o! It’s the word of the day! An enthogen is psychoactive drug used in a religious or shamanic context. Basically after a day of hunting and gathering, the boys huddled up in the teepee, got high, and looked for god(s).

Anyway, I guess tobacco was American even before this country had its name. Furthermore, tobacco is southern and North Carolinian. Tobacco was a primary factor in the development of this state’s economy centuries ago. Today, North Carolina is still among the country’s top tobacco producers along with Tennessee, Virginia, and Kentucky.

Now, now; I realize tobacco is bad. I realize you or somebody you know has lost someone close because of illness due to tobacco use. Please don’t go off getting huffy and puffy thinking I’m going to sit here and waste your time talking about how cool and awesome tobacco is. I will indeed talk about how deadly it is…later.

Before I go on, let me say this. I started chewing and dipping tobacco when I was 16 years old as a high school sophomore (or as Woody Durham would say, “soffuh-more”). I quit chewing and dipping tobacco 3 years, 11 days, and 8 hours ago in Burlington, North Carolina while broadcasting for the Burlington Indians.

Why did I do it for so long? Why did I do it at all? Have you ever thrown in a big friggin’ chaw (AKA a chomper, a chewski, a wad, a baseball-sized mass of wackey tobackey)? Or, have you thrown in a big ol’ fatty (AKA a lipper, a dip, a smacker, a dinger, a Hugo)? Have you had that slight burning/tickling sensation on your gums and lips right before you get mildly light-headed and feel full-body relaxation? Have you ever lit up a cig? Ever inhaled as deeply as possible to hold in all the nicotine-goodyness you could before exhaling that magic stuff into the atmosphere, allowing Mother Nature to get a contact-high? All that stuff is nice isn’t it?

Well. All that cool stuff mentioned above will friggin’ kill you. It will flippin’ put you six feet under. It will bring you down to China Town homeboy. If you use tobacco, you could “buy the farm,” “push up daisies,” “go to pasture,” “go to a skeleton slumber party”… Let’s see, you could also “cash in your chips,” “croak,” “punch your ticket,” “PERISH” (that one’s intense), and “bite the dust.” Bottom line, it could be “Goodbye World, hello Glory” if you use tobacco.

If it doesn’t kill you, it will cause other problems. Men, let’s just get real…tobacco can cause your “unit” to not function properly. Women, smoking can wrinkle your skin more than a night-crawler or worm left out on an asphalt sidewalk in the middle of August. Chew and dip will cause funky little sores to pop up in your mouth. Yep, most of them will go away…until one doesn’t. All of these scary things are why I quit, and why if you’re a user, you should stop too. I’m not going to stop you though; as a former tobacco user, I know this. Quitting has to be on your own time, and it has to be your decision.

It’s not easy. In fact I still think about how bad I want a chew every daggum day. People I have flippin’ dreams where I’m dipping or chewing…I start freaking out saying, “why did I start back up? This is so stupid!” And then, I try to spit the stuff out, but I can’t get it all out. Those dreams stink. I ain’t making this stuff up. Nicotine is some intense stuff.

However, if you are a tobacco user and you want to quit; you can do it! If you’ve never used or even tried tobacco, congratulations! Do not ever try the stuff. It’s not worth it. Now, where tobacco and America have recently clashed is in court. Should the states and federal government be regulating tobacco or regulating its use? The FDA now has regulatory authority over tobacco. The state of North Carolina has banned smoking in restaurants and bars. I am very weary of such legislation; plan and simple. I hate smoke in bars, but I don’t think the government should be telling you, you can’t do it. The restaurant or bar owner should make that call. “Well, no one would disallow tobacco in their establishments unless the government made them,” some of you will undoubtedly say. To you, I respond, “Well don’t flipping go out to eat or go out on the town if you don’t want to encounter smoke and tobacco products. Eating out is terribly expensive and unhealthy anyway. Lord knows this country is overweight as it is. It wouldn’t hurt us to stay at home and eat a turkey sandwich with Sun Chips and grapes instead of eating out and having brewskis three nights a week.”

If you disagree with me, and you’re for legislation against tobacco, you’ll never change my mind with an e-mail or through a conversation. You will never change my mind, just like I’ll never change yours. BUT, I respect your opinions, and I always like hearing them. We have all got to do a better job of respecting people with differing political and cultural views. We don’t have to like these people; we don’t have to play Rummy with them on Wednesday nights; we don’t have to change ourselves to be like them. But we need to respect each other, and we need to listen.
I am shocked at how much of an ultra-tolerant hippy I sounded like in that last paragraph; better put this to press quickly before I edit it down.