How to Tether to an O-2 Tank

About 4:30 this morning, I was lying awake when I heard a sound distressing to my nurse’s ears.  Our bedroom is at the back of our apartment.  The window was open a bit and faces the driveway of an adjacent apartment building.  The sound I heard was a man coughing, but not just any cough.  The cough exhibited the telltale sound of constricted airways.  I wondered if he was having an asthma attack.  I thought perhaps he was on the way to his car, but there was never the sound of a car door, and the concerning cough continued.

Eventually I got out of bed and peeked under the shade.  A man was standing on the small back porch of the building behind our apartment complex.  I watched for only a few seconds when I saw the flash of a lighter being used.  He was smoking.  Ah!  That was the explanation for the horrible cough.

I wanted to shout out the window…”Oh, please, mister.  Stop smoking!  Don’t you know you are already showing signs of COPD?  You will soon be tethered to an oxygen tank.”  But it was 4:30 AM, and I wasn’t sure who else I might awaken in our complex.  I was certain one of those disturbed would be my husband.  I also was fairly certain the guy wouldn’t think I was the voice of God or an angel giving him a message not to be ignored.  I was just a busybody old woman peeking out of her bedroom window.

I went back to bed thinking about the whole notion of smoking.  I grew up in a family with many smokers.  My paternal grandfather smoked cigars and died at 69.  My Dad smoked cigarettes until I was about 7 years old.  He quit and living to be almost 91.  My maternal grandfather smoked and died at 65.  My mother’s three brothers smoked and died at 50, 61 and 70.  Two of her brother’s wives smoked.  I am uncertain how old they were when their health deteriorated.  But, there certainly was a pattern in our family between smoking and not living to a ripe old age.

I saw so much smoking when I was little, that it is somewhat attractive to me.  The whole notion of having something in one’s mouth and manipulating the cigarette is something I can almost feel myself doing.  I certainly “smoked” candy cigarettes as a child and imitated the motions I had seen.  I have, however, never tried a single cigarette in my life.

I wonder if no one has worked on the idea of developing a cigarette than is pleasant to inhale, but which also delivers medication to open airways without filling the lungs with black goo.

Things to ponder when awake at night.