Poor Little Cigarette

Yeah, that's what I think: poor, little cigarette. Probably you maybe be thinking I shouldn't stick up for it all the bad things it's been put the blame on: lung cancer, enphysema, heart attack, stroke and ,eventually, DEATH. Ok, fine. But I'm still trying to understand why people behave as if it was the only thing that could lead you to death nowadays. Ok, I'll try harder to get my message across...

There was this girl who I was in love with (believe me, it has already happened...and for long 10 years) and, when she moved to another neighborhood, I had the chance to pay her a visit in order to catch up. We were two dumb 15 year-old teens who were going through this difficult phase of our lives (I would say ugly as well), when we think we know almost everything about everything. Then, I rang her, she came down, we hugged each other and talked about all the things we antecipated to tell one another. Then, for my surprise, as if it was really normal, she just pulled a cigarette out of her pocket and said she needed a lighter. That was completely shocking for me (please, it was 1997 for crying out loud!) and I didn't hesitate to grab her cigarette roughly from her hand and throw it away. Her face was like "what the fuck are you doing?" but then I explained that it would make her harm and definitely wasn't good for her health. You may be thinking "yeah, Plinio, and you were right!", but the thing is who really cares about others nowadays? I'm aware that all the advertising ought to warn the smokers of the risks they may face if they don't stop blowing the stinky cloud at people's faces, but I don't understand why there are people that treat smokers as if they already have the diseases shown on the boxes.

Please, don't get me wrong! I'm not saying that you should start smoking right after reading this post. My point is that there are plenty of things that are even worse than cigarette and no one makes advertisings about them. Example? Gossip. It's bad, stinky (you know what I'm saying), harmful and even so I don't walk on the streets shutting people's mouths. And I have never seen any billboard with the saying "talking about others affects your OWN life". Or even "Mind Your Business". Actually, I think it's the religious part of me which remembers that " the tongue is the most destructive part of your body" (yes, believe me again, I've been to church a couple of times). For this, let's be less hypocrite for once (because I consider impossible not to be a little).Thus, for the ciggies-admirers, if you decide to quit smoking, quit some other more harmful bad habits in your life - and I promise I'll quit mine.