The Pipe Bit: The Difference

“To strive, to seek, to find and not to yield.”

 –Tennyson, Ulysses

“I’ll hold you close in victory.”

–Scandal featuring Patty Smyth, “The Warrior”

By Chris Rentner

            I do—I admit—enjoy a cigarette on occasion.  Nothing goes better with morning coffee (such a duo the film Coffee and Cigarettes was made a while back).  A Camel Frost gives the perfect hint of spearmint to my groggy taste buds, neatly complimenting my morning brew.  And a cigar, well—with the company of my long-suffering wife, watching an unrated horror DVD with a Punch Chateau L double maduro and an adult beverage makes my weekend (as I stated, my wife is long-suffering and very patient).

            Even at work for Big Tobacco (Uhle’s), when blending pipe tobacco I usually smoke a cigar.  Certainly I have a pipe or two at work—quality control, of course—but I have a cigar close at hand.  At home, though, my smoke of choice is usually a pipe.

            I started smoking a pipe in college.  I filled a corn cob from the local Super America gas station with (I think) Apple tobacco and made a damn mess, being a total newbie.  That evening, when my toothbrush hit my tongue, I thought I was going to die.  The pain was incredible; the paste’s foam dripped from my agonized mouth as I screamed “UH BUH!  EEECHMUH,” or exclamations to that effect.

            I kept with pipe smoking, though:  I loved the taste of pipe tobacco and thought I looked sophisticated, even with my humble cob.  As I learned how to properly puff, the tongue bite—for that was my malady that fateful night—decreased then went away.

            My first tries of cigarettes and cigars produced no such lurid memories.  They were easy and, though tasty, disposable.  But my pipe I could keep, and there were many different tobaccos to be tried.  Learning to smoke a pipe was a process, and a commitment, and I think this is one reason why I prefer a pipe to relax or think.  The results of a commitment—hopefully—can reap huge dividends, and so it was with me and pipe smoking.

            The commitment also produced a concentration.  I wanted to learn and do well.  This meant focusing on how to smoke a pipe correctly, and exploring different pipes and tobaccos, and methods of lighting and cleaning and maintaining a pipe…so much simpler to smoke a quick cigarette or fire up a cigar.  But the difference was a pipe wasn’t easy, it wasn’t thoughtless.  It demanded—and demands—thought, care and attention.

            Maybe pipe smokers are more open to commitment, to long-term relationships.   We know that while a quick smoke is enjoyable, the true rewards come from a conscious agreement to apply the mind, and soul, to a desired pursuit.  And we do, and that makes all the difference.