I hate cigarettes, hate cigarette smoke, and wish no one smoked them...

[markpkessinger]

110. Indeed. Here's a personal story related to this . . .

In 2000, I lost both parents to lung cancer, just 12 days apart (my mother on Dec. 13 and my father on Christmas Day). Both had been heavy smokers for many years, but both had also quit a number of years before becoming ill, but alas it was too late, the damage having already been done.

A month or so later, after I was back in NYC (about 200 miles from the town my parents lived in), I needed to get back to their house to retrieve some things. (My parents had both died at home, and I had taken a leave from my job in NYC to spend their last couple of months with them. I was at each of their sides when they passed.) A friend, I'll call him "Mike," who was a heavy smoker himself, offered to drive me the 3-1/2 hours so I could get what I needed. I was grateful for his assistance.

While I was at the house, trying to quickly gather up what I needed to gather, Mike lit up a cigarette. I said to him, "Mike, I'm sorry, but I have to ask you to step outside if you need to smoke. If one of my siblings were to stop by and smell cigarette smoke, it would really be extremely upsetting to them." Well, Mike threw an absolute fit, going on and on about how "ungrateful" I was in making such a request, etc. I said to him, "Mike, do you even grasp what happened in this house just a few weeks ago?" He responded by saying I couldn't prove their lung cancer had been caused by smoking.

The last item I wanted to take with me was a copy of both parents' obituaries from the local paper. But Mike threatened that I either leave immediately with him or I could find another way back to NYC (which was frankly not a realistic option), so I never did get to retrieve a copy.

I've never been as shocked by a person's complete and utter selfishness and insensitivity as I was that day.