Twenty years ago, I quit smoking. I was 40 years old. I realized at that point that, if I kept smoking, I would have smoked for over half my life. For some reason that was significant to me. And I quit.
Last year I turned 60. I still don’t smoke. That means that, now, I’ve been a nonsmoker for over two-thirds of my life. And that’s a pretty good feeling.
I’ll admit, there are still days I get the urge to smoke. And on those days, I swear I could smoke a mile-long cigarette. But, I know, if I have even one puff, I’ll be back to smoking over two packs a day before I know it.
Twenty years ago, a pack of cigarettes cost under a buck. The stark reality is, today, I could not afford to smoke.
And when I smoked, I could smoke at work, and I could smoke in restaurants, and I could smoke while I walked around the mall. From what I understand there are movements today that want to keep people from smoking in their own homes. I don’t know how smokers do it these days. The pressure must be outrageous.
And there are health reasons, too, which I’m not going to get into. But I will say that even though I’m 20 years older, I feel better now than I ever did as a younger smoker.
I’m not going to harp on smokers. There are a lot of reasons smokers should quit and smokers know those reasons. It wasn’t easy becoming a non-smoker. I’ll admit quitting was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done.
But I’ve never regretted becoming a nonsmoker. Ever.
The above pictures are from old Life Magazines.
CORRECTION TO ABOVE: Twenty years ago, cigarettes cost about $1.87 a pack (not less than $1 as I remembered). As we age, the memory is the first thing to go. 
