Getting It, What It Was Like for Me

[karam]

This is just my experience, and felt I'd like to share it.

I feel it took me at least a year before I learnt to smoke a pipe and really start getting something worthwhile out of it. As a former cigarette smoker I was treating it the same and missing everything. Honestly if someone told me 5-6 years ago that it takes a year to learn how to really smoke a pipe I wouldn't have believed it.

I actually remember when it all clicked together:

• the tobacco was well-packed for the first time, to the point I could set the pipe down for 5-10 minutes and still get smoke out of it,
• the pipe was warm - not hot - to the touch, and suddenly all the indiscriminate flavours started coming out when I'd slowly exhale through the nose.
• The trap was that my first reaction was to puff more to get more taste, which I later realised it diminished what I was getting out of it.
• So I let it down, let it almost die out and started very gently sipping at it, and lo and behold the flavours came back.
• Since then pipe smoking has been transformed for me from a novelty to a real enjoyment.

It really is a hobby, tremendously relaxing and enjoyable. Often when I am smoking a pipe I don't need something else, I focus on that alone. Which brings my big bugbear: I can't/don't smoke in the house unless my wife and kids are away visiting my in-laws, I smoke on the balcony which is miserable. Cold in the winter, hot for most of the day in the summer, I don't have a comfortable chair, I am rushing it (which contradicts all of the above).

EDIT: Fixed Capitalization in Title

 

[mso489]

I can understand that. By the time I bought a pipe and a baggie of tobacco in my early thirties, I'd spent 19 years at home watching my dad smoke, owning one functional pipe at a time and smoking only Granger. But all of the moves and techniques were imprinted on me from earliest childhood. So when I finally tried it myself, it was like I'd had a long series of courses in the subject, everything from packing from a pouch with your thumb to scoop, and lighting a pipe in the wind. There's quite a bit to it, and always more to learn.

 

[anotherbob]

Wait till it's been 20 years and you are still learning something. Generally with drugs (tobacco is a drug, it keeps me from killing people who are being annoying) I've noticed that if it's got an image of being sophisticated that typically means it takes some talent, skill, and refinement to get proper enjoyment. Example a shot of cheap bourbon and a martini are the same drug. A high school student can pour shots and also figure out how to use them, a martini you gotta know something to make a good one and use proper sipping and cadence to really enjoy it.

 

[olkofri]

I'm almost with you there. I'm with you on the big issue of not being able to smoke at home. When it's winter and you have to smoke in your car, parked out on the street... well, it does take away from the enjoyment and relaxation: you treat the smoke, in a way, as a task you have to finish before going back in.

I don't have that slow a cadence yet, and I'm relighting all the time. Big thing for me is that I don't really get tongue burn anymore, thank God.

 

[luigi]

A year to learn how to smoke properly sounds about right. I was so thrilled about all the different tobaccos and different packing and smoking techniques that it seemed like a few weeks.
I have a privilege to smoke inside but it hasn't been forever so I can hear you. With kids in the house it's better to have some patience until they grow up, smoking is a great hobby but still not the most respected virtue on the world.

 

[perdurabo]

I know someone who wants to start smoking a pipe, I need to remind this person to expect at the most, a 1 year learning curve. It took me a year, to really get the hang of it. The retrohale was a bitch, and I smoked cigarettes previously.

 

[Chasing Embers]

It really is a hobby,

For some yes, for others, not really. Just another way to enjoy tobacco. Glad you've found your groove.?

 

[logs]

For some yes, for others, not really. Just another way to enjoy tobacco.

I guess I'm one of the others. I never related to the "hobby" description of pipe smoking. Does a guy sipping whisky say his hobby is getting drunk? I suppose pipe collecting could be considered a hobby but the smoking side of it is something else... a pastime is what I'd call it.

 

[Chasing Embers]

I never related to the "hobby"

Same. I use and enjoy the type of tobacco I have time for at the given moment. Most of the time I'm unconsciously nursing a pipe during day to day activities. Just something I do.

 

[sandollars]

That's a very nice description of your breakthrough. I am thinking you could saved a lot of frustration if you had watched more Youtube?

 

[UncleRasta]

Three months in I marvel at how much more natural it has become, compared to the early(er) days of huffing and puffing and burning the tongue down. Looking forward to the remaining 9 months of my apprenticeship. It's also fun picking up pipe and tobacco myths from the forum (and more so youtube to be fair), only to have them debated and debunked in another thread. Taking it all in while logging my own experiences is how I'm handling it at the moment.

 

[rdoss16]

I guess I'm one of the others. I never related to the "hobby" description of pipe smoking. Does a guy sipping whisky say his hobby is getting drunk? I suppose pipe collecting could be considered a hobby but the smoking side of it is something else... a pastime is what I'd call it.

i see the hobby vs lifestyle debate quite a bit and ive always framed it as if you have one or two pipes and maybe one or two blends and you smoke once or twice a month thats a hobby. but if youre like us, multiple pipes, countless blends, numerous bowls smoked per week, and maybe too much time spent on pipe forums.....its a lifestyle

 

[Chasing Embers]

countless blends, numerous bowls smoked per week, and maybe too much time spent on pipe forums.....its a lifestyle

i.e. addiction