Do you have a lighter?
Sep. 1st, 2008 09:44 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
susandennisTwo times recently, while walking down the street, gaggles of young men have stopped me and asked me if I had a lighter. Not a light. Not a match, but a lighter. I think it's so interesting that 1) I am not invisible to them and 2) I look like I would have a lighter and 3) that they didn't ask for a light.
They were both several years too late. I smoked cigarettes for 40 years and most always had with me a way to light their fire. I do remember couple of dry years in college. I went to a college that was in a very rural part of West Virginia. It was, actually, all there was to town. Except for one general store. I don't remember that store ever running out of cigarettes but periodically they would run out of matches. And getting your cigarette lit was no small feat.
And then came Bic. Before Bic there was Zippo but they were expensive and matches were free. Bic hit the sweet spot in the lighter world. And they held it until the early 90's when yet another one of life's little pleasures was killed by kids. Bic added child proof (actually that should have been people proof) devices onto their lighters so flicking your Bic went from fun to fucking frustrating.
About that time, my friend John, who had moved to Japan to work on the Olympics sent me a care package. In it were 5 lighters (one with each of the Olympic mascots on it) and NONE had those child locks on them. I asked him to please send me more and he did. I still have some today. When he moved to Australia for the Sydney games, he had a smoking buddy do some research and kept me supplied with even more good ones. I even have some of those.
But, I never carry them anywhere any more. Gone are the days of making friends on a smoke break. No more picking up guys from hearing the ping of a Zippo opening up (yep, I did. At a baseball game. He offered me a light from his classic Zippo and that started a 2 year relationship).
The fire is out.
Sorry, guys.
They were both several years too late. I smoked cigarettes for 40 years and most always had with me a way to light their fire. I do remember couple of dry years in college. I went to a college that was in a very rural part of West Virginia. It was, actually, all there was to town. Except for one general store. I don't remember that store ever running out of cigarettes but periodically they would run out of matches. And getting your cigarette lit was no small feat.
And then came Bic. Before Bic there was Zippo but they were expensive and matches were free. Bic hit the sweet spot in the lighter world. And they held it until the early 90's when yet another one of life's little pleasures was killed by kids. Bic added child proof (actually that should have been people proof) devices onto their lighters so flicking your Bic went from fun to fucking frustrating.
About that time, my friend John, who had moved to Japan to work on the Olympics sent me a care package. In it were 5 lighters (one with each of the Olympic mascots on it) and NONE had those child locks on them. I asked him to please send me more and he did. I still have some today. When he moved to Australia for the Sydney games, he had a smoking buddy do some research and kept me supplied with even more good ones. I even have some of those.
But, I never carry them anywhere any more. Gone are the days of making friends on a smoke break. No more picking up guys from hearing the ping of a Zippo opening up (yep, I did. At a baseball game. He offered me a light from his classic Zippo and that started a 2 year relationship).
The fire is out.
Sorry, guys.
