OLD HABITS...the stuff of dreams

A friend of mine who, like me, gave up touching the sauce several years back expressed some surprise when I told him recently that I often dream of drinking.
"I can't believe you're still having thirsty dreams after all these years", he chided.
"Most guys lose those after a year or so."

Well, what the hell? I'll have to check with Lloyd my dreamland bartender to find out what can be done. Knowing Lloyd, he'll recommend that I have another "splash" to help us rectify the situation. "Come on...just one more. You're not drivin."
In my defense I would like to note that for whatever reason I now seem to drink beer and wine while in repose. This is a marked improvement over the dreams of my early sobriety. Those somnambulistic trances often involved massive quantities of Jack Daniels and reckless behavior. Real progress appears to have been made.
Again, this is dreaming we're talking about. When awake I remain a Good Boy...at least when it comes to "touching the stuff".

All of this got me thinking about habits. Good habits and especially BAD habits die hard. Advertising doesn't help either.

When I was a boy I couldn't wait to start smoking. All of the cool guys smoked: movie stars, athletes, thugs, your dad's cool friends. Your dad smoked too and, though he was definitely NOT cool, you tended to overlook that fact and watched him to learn how to fire one up.

Most guys can remember the first cigarette they had. I was seven. My hoodlum pal, Phil Brown, had swiped a pack of his mother's KOOLs and we were set to let the good times roll. Mrs. Brown smoked 24/7 and had no clue that young Phil and I had made off with her UNFILTERED KOOLs. (Yeah, they made 'em back then.) We hightailed the cigs and a box of matches down to the creek which ran behind the Brown aboded in the little town of Leslie, Michigan and proceeded to become cool with the purloined KOOLs.

Late that same afternoon as I was puking my guts out behind the big mulberry tree next-door to my house I had pretty much decided that KOOLs would not be my butts of choice when I grew up. I decided that, like my dad, I was probably more suited to be a Camel Man. It must be genetic. That day was also the beginning of my radio career. After selling my mom the story that I "smelled like this because I had been standing too close to a bonfire" I knew I could sell anybody anything.

Kids today have it much easier. They don't have the Marlboro Man or big time celebrities pitching instant cool via tobacco. They just see a bunch of dumpy looking old cats hanging around outside buildings sucking on their nicotine "fix sticks". No glamour there.




The Marlboro Man roped himself a case of cancer







Time to wrap this up. It's getting near bedtime and I've got to give the wine a chance to breathe.