Rediscovering The Why
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G. L. Pease - Feb 8, 2022
- 6 min read
Why do you smoke a pipe? We all have stories to tell about what set us along this crazy path, but those stories are too often lost in time, even to ourselves. Pipes and pipe smoking have held a deep fascination for me for many years, but I have felt, recently, a bit like a lost traveler. Sometime during the past couple years, because of, you know, things, I found myself losing touch with my own pipe story, my why. Smoking a pipe started to become almost unconsciously automatic, just something to do. While I still enjoyed it, the celebration, the passion had gone missing.
Some back story may be in order. Pipe smoking is something that’s been in my brain from the first time, as a very young lad on a rainy day shopping trip with my mother, I found myself in Berkeley’s Drucquer & Sons. We were there to buy a gift for my uncle, probably some cigars. That part is fuzzy, but the impact of being in that shop has always been crystal clear. It was a place of wonder. Dark wood and glass cabinets were filled with what seemed like thousands of pipes of all shapes and sizes. The paneled walls with still more pipes, large apothecary jars filled with shop blended tobaccos, and shelves holding hundreds of colorful tins behind the counter all made a lasting impression.
Some years later, I had a high school chemistry teacher, a kind and gentle man, who smoked a pipe. (How things have changed. Today, the thought of a teacher standing in front of a classroom puffing away and pointing at the chalkboard with the stem of his pipe seems as strangely foreign as taking a walk on another planet.) His tobacco of choice was Borkum Riff. It made him easy to find; the aroma from his pipe lingered in the air wherever he’d been. Being a bit of an odd kid (a more polite word might be eccentric), I decided it would be fun to take up the pipe. I bought a blister-packed Medico from the local drugstore, and a couple pouches of tobacco – Borkum Riff, of course, and a Green Apple blend that smelled appealing to my naive sensibilities, but turned out to be something rather more treacherous than its aroma promised.
I did what I thought I’d seen others do, stuffing the pipe with strands of tobacco, pressing it down with my thumb, striking a match and puffing like a steam locomotive mounting a steep grade. It was not a successful start. The tobacco tasted nothing like it smelled, keeping the pipe lit was a Sisyphean task, and whatever minute pleasure revealed itself in the resulting hot, acrid smoke just wasn’t compelling enough to make the whole affair worth what seemed to be considerable effort. I soon gave it up, but the latent shadow of fascination would persist.
I tried a couple more times, but it wasn’t until my early university days that it really took hold. By then, pipe smokers were already becoming something of a rarity, but they were not yet on the endangered species list. One day, encountering a tweedy, bespectacled and bearded professor puffing away as he strolled through Sproul Plaza, a stack of papers and books in one hand, a pipe in the other, memories of that rainy day at Drucquer’s filled my head, so I wandered down University Avenue to pay a visit. In an instant, it all came back, all the magic and wonder. Walking through those doors took me into another world, another time. It felt like home.
The fascination instantly took hold, and I knew I wanted to, had to, perform whatever initiation rites were necessary to be part of this “secret society.” I started learning everything I could about pipes, about tobacco, about the culture and ritual surrounding this ancient pastime. I learned how to fill a pipe properly, how to light it, how to keep it going, and not to be concerned if I had to relight. I met interesting people, and had wonderful conversations. I was accepted into the fold. I became a pipe smoker. The passion and enthusiasm cultivated within those hallowed walls seemed like it would last forever, and it almost did. Until it didn’t.
What happened to change things for me? More than two years of no pipe shows, no casual meetups with like-minded folk sharing pipe and tobacco stories happened. Feeling alone, a stranger in a strange land happened. Not all at once. It was a gradual thing. I’d smoke my pipe in what I thought to be the same state of mind I’d always had. I still enjoyed opening old dusty tins of vintage leaf, savoring the flavors and aromas to be found within them. I still looked at pipes, still acquired new additions to my collection, but it just wasn’t the same. Gradually, the excitement began to wane. Pipes were becoming things, and smoking them was becoming something to do, not a way of being.
I remember thinking about a time when, at the Sacramento pipe show, I’d just picked up a beautiful sandblasted olifant made by my friend Paolo Becker. It was an exhilarating moment. I had a similar pipe made by his late father, Fritz, whom I’d known for years, and this pipe beautifully represented a commemoration of two generations of pipe-maker. I filled it from the tin of Piccadilly I had with me, and was in bliss. My friend David saw my exuberance, and asked, “How is it that after all these years, you’re still so enthusiastic about pipes?” It was a fair question. And, who knew that nearly 20 years later, I would ask myself where that fervor went?
Fortunately, the loss of pipe-lust was a relatively short-stayed guest that left my company more quickly than it had arrived. One morning, examining a favored piece in preparation of photographing it, it all came back in a flash. I relished the curves, the lines, the angles, the wood. I looked at it carefully from all angles, admiring the grace of it, the balance. I love photographing pipes. It’s challenging, technically, but even more so aesthetically. I try to not just take mug shots, but to make portraits that express something more than just a shape, a piece of wood and plastic. Pipes are things of both practicality and beauty, and I like to express that through my own art. Something clicked in that moment, the light came on, and Mr. Crankypants was shown the door.
Through the simple act of looking more carefully, more deeply at one of my cherished briars, I inadvertently rediscovered my why. The joy returned. I pulled that Becker olifant from its drawer, filled it from an aged tin of Piccadilly, and in turn, it once again filled me with all the wonder and enthusiasm that it did when I first got it. Now, all I need is to ring up a few pipe pals to arrange a get-together and share my rekindled enthusiasm.
Photo by G.L. Pease
Written by G. L. Pease
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Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 636. Our featured interview on tonight’s show is with Barry Kane. Barry started smoking a pipe in 1961 when he was 14-years old. Back then it seemed like everybody smoked, and you could buy pipes and tobacco just about anywhere. Barry is a true old-school pipe smoker, sticking to just one blend. See if you can guess which one before listening. At the top of the show Brian will give his take on Scandinavian Tobacco Group’s purchase of Mac Baren and Sutliff Tobacco and their announcement that they will be shut down.
There’s a pipe in my collection that I cannot bring myself to smoke, though I’ve had it for more years than I care to recall. It’s old, or shall I say, well experienced; that experience, that oldness came to it long before it was in my possession. The pipe is an old Comoy’s Grand Slam from the 1940s. The shape (#93), a slightly canted, stack billiard (sometimes referred to as a Belgian) is right up my alley, and it’s a beautiful example of it. It came to me with some wear and tear; nothing unusual for an old pipe, but more the signs of one that has been well loved, smoked a lot, treated as a favorite tool, cherished, in a sense, by frequent use. It’s the pipe equivalent of a vintage car that’s been driven a lot, enjoyed fully and maintained adequately, rather than one kept in a spotless garage, dusted and detailed weekly, brought out only for leisurely Sunday drives, or to be ogled behind the ropes at the next Concours d’Elegance. When it arrived, those uncounted years ago, it wanted a little restoration. Nothing dramatic needed to be done to it, but the stem was oxidized, the finish a little dingy. The cake was even and fairly thin, and the airway was relatively clean, both signs that its previous owner cared for it, but the bowl’s surface was a little drab and dull. It took little effort to reveal its beauty, to show the lovely contrasted stain and interesting grain beneath the old wax. I often think I should do before and after photos of pipes that I work on, but those thoughts always come after the work’s been done. This one would have been a great illustration of how years of handling that can sometimes make a pipe more beautiful, can other times make it just look grungy. Once I’d cleaned up the externals, it was time to address the inside bits. I approach this a little bassackwards, I realize. It would be more sensible to take care of the inside before addressing the outside, but it’s how I roll. If an old pipe isn’t pretty to look at, it’s unlikely that I’ll care much about it, and cleaning is usually the hardest part, or at least the most boring part of any restoration for me. Alcohol and pipe cleaners. Lots of pipe cleaners. That’s why I leave it for last. Sometimes, I’ll even give a pipe a test smoke before a deep cleaning, just for a point of reference. I gave it a sniff to get an idea of what I was up against, and it stopped me cold. There in that bowl was an aroma that I had not smelled in decades. My head was instantly filled with memories of being in the back room of a fabled Berkeley tobacconist’s shop where I stumbled upon a few jars of long discontinued blends. One of them, a blend called Forty and Eight, had the most engaging and unusual scent of any tobacco I’d stuck my schnoz into. It was sweet, but not in a candy store way. There were none of the usual vanilla, cherry, berry or anise notes of typical aromatics, nothing that could be compared to aftershave or deodorant soap, but something almost musky, a little earthy, something exotic. The shop’s owner couldn’t tell me what was in it, how, or where it had been produced. The old blend had been retired before he’d bought the place. The printed catalogue gave no clues, either, other than being overprinted with the word “DISCONTINUED” in bold, rubber-stamp type. (And, I don’t recall it as being “highly aromatic” as the description indicates.) There was still quite a bit in the jar. Being, at that point, an intrepid explorer of all kinds of tobaccos, whether I thought I’d like them or not, I had to give it a try. It was burly based, but also comprised a good measure of virginia leaf, and maybe some other varieties; I didn’t have enough experience at the time to really pick it apart. But, that aroma was unlike anything I’d experienced before or since. It was something now completely lost to time. Until it wasn’t. Memories are powerful things, and there is no sense more tightly bound to memory than our sense of smell. One whiff was all it took to carry me back in time, conjuring a vivid recollection of something long submerged in the inky depths of a subconscious mind. Look, I know as well as anyone that pipes are meant to be smoked, and that many feel it almost sacrilegious to have a pipe and not set it to its intended task. In this case, I simply can’t. I won’t. Ever. Rationally, I am fairly certain this pipe would probably be a great smoke. It was too well loved by its previous caretaker to be anything less than that. My choice not to smoke it is an emotional one, not something rational. Of the thousands of pipes that have passed through my hands over the years, this is the only one to create such a singular and vivid, almost Proustian recollection of temps perdu, of lost time. It revivified a long dormant memory that is mine, and mine alone, and that’s enough. I keep it in a drawer with other old English pipes. In some ways, it’s nothing special, just a nice old pipe. I don’t lavish it with any particular care that arguably befits the hidden treasure that it holds. It’s not in a special box, or displayed preciously in a glass cabinet. Every once in a while, I take it out, point my nose bowlwards, and every time, those memories return just as powerfully as they did the first time. I have no idea how long it’s been since its last owner smoked it, but in the years I’ve had it, there seems to have been very little degradation of the aroma, and that’s […]
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Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 634! Our featured interview on tonight’s show is with Warren Ertle. Warren is an extremely accomplished musician with a PhD in music. He started early as a percussionist in sixth grade. Later his grandmother got him a cheap Casio keyboard which he taught himself to play. He started playing in blues bands in high school, and has been a pianist with jazz big bands for years. Even though he was already a professional musician, he took his first real piano lesson when he enrolled in college with his studies in classical music. He is of course a pipe smoker. At the top of the show we will have an Ask the Tobacco Blender segment with Jeremy Reeves. Jeremy is the Head Blender at Cornell & Diehl, which is one of the most popular boutique pipe tobacco companies in the USA.
Soon now, supposedly, our neighborhoods will shift from grinning pumpkins, skeletons in various assortments, and zombies dashing about to pretty reindeer, angels, and flashing lights illuminating homes with sparkling stars and laughing, scurrying Santas. But, lest we forget, there is the turkey season, fancy pie aromas wafting from kitchens, and a national pardon of a big Tom Turkey. Remember, now, that only one of these holiday personalities is a pipe smoker. And that is the hefty, bearded fellow in a bright red suit sitting in a sleigh with a herd of deer hitched up and ready to streak across the globe, bringing tidings of joy and many presents. Ok, the scene is set for the next couple of months, right? So, before we get too far off the beaten path, let’s just take a deep breath of fresh autumn air, shall we? Ahh. That’s better, isn’t it? What’s got the Pundit in a snit is not all the Halloween spooks who came a-jostling for candy. Or the wild turkeys gobbling in the backwoods or all the fuss and feathers over the big one—Christmas. No, it is that we might need to take note of all the little things that mean so much to us. Like a good sunrise (seriously, Pundit has not gone all Pollyanna.) Mayhaps we need to appreciate more of what we have than what we have not. Or something like that. Like, a good pipe in the morning with coffee as the dawn brings us coolish weather now that we have flipped the calendar to autumn. But it also brings beautiful leaves that have become a spectacle of technicolor in the wind. It is the little things. The rereading of an enjoyable book and finding something you did not see or learn in the first go-round. Or a stunning phrase you commit to memory with the re-read, while smoking that favorite pipe. And you notice a superior puff that just seems to be different. It’s in the air and the seasons of meaningful little things. It’s aromatic! Or perhaps it is that sense of satisfaction knowing and appreciating you made it to another day. With the world in a kind of rinse-and-repeat history, reminiscent of a Shakespearean play, it is perhaps a good moment to remember some of Pipedom’s philosophers whose cogent thoughts brought light to clear a path in the mists of confusion and confounding opinions. Ok. No gloom and doom. Just some down-home thoughts. Think of times in the past when history was running off the rails. It took our pipe-smoking thinkers (the mind workers of the world) to speak of better pathways to more light. Think for a moment, with a pipe in hand, these wizards of the world and word: Albert Einstein, J. R.R. Tolkien, Mark Twain, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Edwin Hubble, Bertrand Russell, C. S. Lewis, and Jean-Paul Sartre. All learned and enlightened. They offered wisdom instead of storms of meaningless roads to nowhere. All while smoking their pipes! Maybe especially with the help of their pipes in the art of thinking and philosophy. Recall the words of Mr. E=MC2 when he said, “I believe that pipe smoking contributes to a somewhat calm and objective judgment in all human affairs.” Amen and amen! Dealing with world-rattling events takes a calm and objective view of things, to the Pundit’s way of summing it up. You just don’t go messing around with quantum physics without a calm and objective approach, methinks. Or as the extraordinary physicist Robert Oppenheimer said after he and a team in the Manhattan Project at Los Alamos Labs developed a way to split atoms into bombs during World War II. “I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds,” said Oppenheimer referring to the development of the first nuclear bombs dropped on Japan. It must be pointed out that Oppenheimer was more of a cigarette smoker than a pipe smoker. Nonetheless, pipes were part of his personality. Now, if you have read some of the great authors of the past and present, their pipes were always nearby. Reading Sir Arthur Conan Doyle can be a three-pipe problem at times. S. Lewis and Jean-Paul Sartre require time with your pipes to reflect on the existential problems and solutions these authors provide in learned novels and other narratives. Or take Edwin Hubble and Bertrand Russell, philosophers of another world. Pipes are required for reading. The quantum lode of ideas Pundit is attempting to sort out is that our pipes are relaxing and stimulate our thoughts and creativity. Especially in these last months of the year. Many times Pundit has had that light bulb flick on while smoking my beloved pipes. And friends in Pipedom, it ain’t easy to turn on the lights in Pundit’s rock pit head. Now it’s time for a quote from a Pipe Smoker of the Past. Shelby Foote was born Nov. 17, 1916, in Greenville, Miss., and died June 27, 2005, in Memphis, Tenn. A fact is not a truth until you love it—Shelby Foote. A parting thought: It is said that famed Southern author William Faulkner carried a packed pipe in a coat pocket wherever he went. That’s one effective way to deal with workday conflicts and confusion. A calm and objective judgment in our everyday human affairs, as the quantum man said.
Welcome to The Pipes Magazine Radio Show Episode 633. Our featured guest tonight is Jon David Cole. JD is the Owner/Tobacconist at The Country Squire in Jackson, MS, and the accompanying online store. We’ll have JD and Brian talking about what’s new at the store and in the business in general. At the top of the show, Brian will discuss tobacco growing, what happens to the leaf, and provide updated information on where tobacco is being gown today. Tobacco production originated in the United States and we were once the #1 producer. It’s quite different now.
Another great piece Greg. Thank you. I enjoyed reading it with my morning coffee and a bowl of well aged Chelsea Morning. It gave me cause to reflect on the same question for my own pipe smoking.
I always enjoy your photography of pipes. You always capture the pipe properly, it’s shape, lines and textures in a way I haven’t seen before. Just marvelous.
Timely article! A good guide for helping me get back to the level of magic I had a while ago.
Thank you.