Laurie:  Someone just slipped a three-page Smoke-Free Household Survey under my door.  Seems like my building is going smoke free.  No easy endeavor with 1600+ apartments in the complex, but they are going to give it a try anyway.  By July 22^nd we are all supposed to cough up (yeah, I had to do it) information about ourselves and our family members and their smoking habits.  Declare your inability to break your filthy, disgusting, health-destroying addiction to cigarettes, and you will be benevolently grandfathered in (as a loser who can’t kick the habit I guess).  But if you’re just moving in, forget about it.  Not only can’t you as an individual smoke, but you may as well send “See ya!” cards to your smoking friends.  They won’t even be allowed to light up on the balconies.  I feel footprints all over my rights.

elizabeth: Don’t know how I feel about this. It does smack of Big Brother peeking into people’s apartments and telling them what to do or not do.  I was a smoker for a long time, and it was so hard to stop and then you start over again and you feel guilt ridden and then you try to stop again. And so on and so on. I finally gave it up about six years ago at a hypnosis session in a hotel with about 200 people. Men had to wear a metal reinforced cup until my bitchiness subsided a bit. About a week ago.

But I loved to smoke. It was an extension of my hand and it was always good to wave it around when making a point (or threatening someone) or you could grab one and think about what you wanted to say or do. I don’t care what anyone says – it did calm me down during some tense situations. But I made the decision to stop. Because I wasn’t going to let some fat cats who own tobacco farms take away my life. When I go, I want to decide how – in the afterglow with some young stud muffin works for me. Okay one with bad eyesight because I would like to be really old. Not older than graveyard dirt, but close.

Laurie:  I’m not in favor of smoking.  I’m thrilled that I finally kicked the habit (no more treks Down-South and to Indian reservations) and couldn’t afford to fall off the wagon if I wanted to.  Cigarettes in New York have tipped a whopping $10 a pack I believe.  But this further emphasizes my concern.  Cigarettes are still on sale and available in every State of the Union.  So if they are that bad for my health, will slay my friends and family with their second-hand smoke in one fell swoop, and are linked to every disease known to humankind, why can I still pick up a pack at my local Korean deli?  In a city where gas fumes from taxis and busses rule the congested roads, to regulate smoking in my apartment seems a bit silly.  To attempt to regulate my health seems a bit illegal.  Granted, the insurance companies do it all the time but my apartment building?  Nonetheless, I will say a little prayer of gratitude that I no longer smoke, meet my smoking friends at nonsmoke-free buildings, and avoid the wrath of the Smoke Detection Police when they show up at my door.  And I guess I’ll try to convince myself that this is “for my own good,” just like my mother used to tell me when I wasn’t allowed to do something.  I never believed her.

elizabeth: So as much as I know that smoking is a killer looking for its next victim, I still feel we can’t tell people what to do. I can really see them trying to get kids to not start, and if you are going to try to restrict this self destructive behavior – give people a guaranteed way to stop and make it reasonable so people can afford it.  I think $11 a pack might make some people stop so that they don’t end up homeless.  But telling people they can’t get an apartment because they smoke – what’s next? Twinkies addicts, soda sippers and liverwurst lovers (talk about something needing to be banned) being thrown out into the streets?

I had a neighbor on 89^th Street in Manhattan who left me notes about my smoking. This was from a woman who had really loud sex a lot of the time. So maybe she didn’t smoke after sex, but after listening to her escapades, having a cigarette seemed like the polite thing to do. As opposed to me going out and picking up a male hooker for myself.

© 2010, Coaches on the Edge ™

If you would like to learn more about Laurie, please go to her site: Empowered Life Journeys.

Stop by at elizabeth’s site at: Coaching for the Creative Soul