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Saturday 2 August 2014

Tobacco Almost Destroyed My Family Visits

Tobacco wedged a deadly sword between me and my family. I hated visiting, seldom went due to tobacco nor could I stay long. Trying to spend the night was intolerable. I was coughing and gagging with a burning throat and dry eyes. I had to carry eye drops with me. I would use aerosols to mask the tobacco, burn incense, burn candles. The smokers would even offer to smoke outside, but the lingering second-hand smoke was next to impossible.
Babysitting the dog while they went away was a big mistake. I thought to myself, "Well, I really want to help my family, and I love the cute little doggie. (Poor dog, he seems to have a smoker's cough!)   Surely the fumes will have lessened by a day or two..."

 Ouch! I was in for a nasty surprise. The toilet paper reeked of tobacco. The towels still exuded tobacco. Every cushion on the sofa I moved about let off smells, the mattress, sheets and pillows were permeated in it, all the furniture was steeped and drenched in tobacco smell...I'm sorry if I bore or offend here, but the point of my blog is to communicate to smokers and nonsmokers the reality of this ugly situation so we can start to take some serious action.

Take breakfast the next morning. Not a way I would want to start my day. All I wanted was some toast. With butter. I love butter, but as I took a bite of my buttered toast all I could taste was tobacco. For some crazy reason they refrigerate their cigarettes so they stay fresher. Gone were the cigarettes along with them, but the whole fridge door had retained a dark yellow, greasy, staining residue of tobacco. I got so angry about this fridge one day that I lost my voice in an argument. I had lost all serenity. That's when I knew I had to take action. So I started this blog.

 Maybe now you understand why I am not keen about tobacco. Maybe now you can understand my frustration. And why I blog incessantly as I do. Dear reader, whether you care for your loved one, friend, work associate or neighbour, I think you share my frustration. You must know someone whom it is very unpleasant to visit, a torture chamber of sorts because you can't simply breathe in peace. Are you along with me?

Restaurants, cafes, bars, sports arenas, malls, patios, beaches and parks and all municipal government property is smoke-free in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. But why is the home and apartments the last frontier? I can't visit some great friends of mine, because of second-hand smoke. I read somewhere reputable that indoor air is five times dirtier than outdoor air. Yikes! Tobacco must have a lot to do with it.

The more people we reach, the more we can bring about radical changes. We must move past the 1980s mentality of smoking versus non-smoking sections of restaurants and airplanes. No tobacco smoke ANYWHERE is good.  Are you with me?
Tell everyone you know that there can be a tobacco free world one day, and please direct them to my blog at nikkidiamond.ca


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