The desolation of pipe smoking

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bromano

Lurker
Mar 3, 2017
8
0
Hello all. I’m new in this forum and this is my first post. I live in São Paulo, Brazil, where I write history textbooks for a living, and where tobacco importation is all but forbidden and pipes cost a whole lot of cash to get.
But man, I sure like this thing! A buddy of mine introduced me to the hobby about two years ago, and despite the hard time to pack, constant relights and the oddness of my first pipe (a brandless “made in Thailand” meerschaum I bought in Holland), I got used to the whole adventure. It’s now one of my favorite spare times.
The point of my post, however – despite, of course, introducing myself to this exquisite gentleman community – is to talk about a general feeling I have about pipe smoking: a subtle melancholy. I sincerely wonder if it’s only me.
As opposed from other trends amongst youth nowadays, like grinding your special blend of coffee at home, or brewing your own craft beer in the backyard, pipe smoking seems like a fading art. While those are thriving from underground towards a glorious future, pipe smoking appears to be on the verge of disappearance every time (Dunhill about to close blending, FDA about to ruin blending in America forever, so on)… In my country, which isn’t the land of the free and home of the brave, intrusive state regulation abounds just as much as corruption does. Therefore, in a traditional tobacco shop around here, you’ll find only those excessively mild national blends plus Captain Black, and that’s it, nothing more. Zero. Nada. Dunhill EMP costs around US$ 51,00 – No kidding, and it wasn’t always this way.
As a result, every nice thing I discover about pipes or tobacco seem not to be recently invented or created, but to have merely survived destruction, inherited to us from older generations by mere chance or remarkable willpower (I recently came across G.L. Pease however, an inspiring exception to this rule).To a young newcomer like me, it’s much like arriving at the end of the party, when people are turning the chairs on top of tables, the music is done playing, and the floor is a mess.
In other words: melancholic.
Do you share this feeling as well? Or am I just heavy influenced by the arrogant heavy state anti-tabagism in the country I live in, plus my historian habits?
P.S. – Please excuse my mistakes in my English.

 

georged

Lifer
Mar 7, 2013
5,491
13,920
My take on the situation is merely that "habit smoking" and "fashion smoking"---in 1948, 20%+ of all adult American males smoked a pipe, for example---are giving way to a smaller group of passionate enthusiasts who engage in it because they choose to. Not because some chemical in their blood compels them, or because some hoped-for societal acceptance lures them into it.
The result is that the finest pipes the world has ever known are being made today, the Internet has made finding and buying them orders of magnitude easier than in the pre-Internet era, and the level of knowledge of the average smoker is high.

 
M

mothernaturewilleatusallforbreakfast

Guest
Welcome to the forum. We are all just turds floating down the toilet expressway of life waiting to be flushed again and again. :cry:

 

pagan

Lifer
May 6, 2016
5,963
28
West Texas
Welcome, sounds like you have a pretty good understanding of things as they are
Since you have a background in History might I suggest writing your own Pipe story from the beginning and how it progresses thru life, could be an interesting read by time of your retirement. Keep smoking :puffpipe:

 

iamn8

Lifer
Sep 8, 2014
4,248
14
Moody, AL
Very good English and very well said. Most of us have the same feeling although we try to sugarcoat it. Welcome to the party! Better late than never :)

 

mso489

Lifer
Feb 21, 2013
41,210
60,433
Certainly, in terms of numbers of pipe smokers, the pipe glory days are in the past, for now anyway. If you dwell on that, the prospects seem gloomy, and more so in that regulations in the U.S. appear to be closing down tobacco blending and pipe carving in their most creative forms. I think Forums, and pipe shops and clubs and shows, are populated by wild-eyed optimists who bid to continue their atavistic habits one way or another. Many of us are codgers, but others are younger. Personally, I don't expect the blossoming of pipe smoking as a majority activity, but I think it will remain around as a specialized interest for the foreseeable future. That's my wild-eyed optimist view.

 

pipeman84

Lurker
Dec 9, 2016
45
0
Yes, I too think pipe smoking is somewhat melancholic - but also that it is a gentlemanly (see how some brands, Old Gowrie for instance, have on the tin 'for gentlemen only' :) ), time-tested form of enjoying tobacco. Half jokingly I say to myself: let the boys play with all the vaping and heat not burn gizmos. Men will always stick to pipes and cigars. 8)

 

aimlesswanderer

Starting to Get Obsessed
Jun 25, 2016
211
2
Maybe one day it will disappear completely, but I'll be able to tell people I tried it, and I enjoyed it.
The writing on the wall is one of the things that helps to prevent me getting too absorbed in this pastime. I intend to keep enjoying it while ever it's around, but not let it become so large a part of my life that it hurts if it leaves the world before I do.

 

jpmcwjr

Moderator
Staff member
May 12, 2015
24,570
27,079
Carmel Valley, CA
Welcome to the forum! Nicely written and thought provoking.
There's at least one top notch Brazilian pipe carver, Gustavo Cunha. Photo below:
khfpwuT.jpg

Taken at the West Coast pipe show. LINK to the THREAD.

 

prairiedruid

Lifer
Jun 30, 2015
1,998
1,117
Welcome to the forum; great post! My take on the situation is not to get hung up on the grand picture of pipe smoking's demise. I enjoy my pipes, they help with my depression. I'm lucky enough to live in the U.S. where there are a plethora of different blends at affordable prices. Yes the future may not look bright but it still comes down to a boy with his pipe enjoying the ritual and the taste.

 

madox07

Lifer
Dec 12, 2016
1,823
1,689
Very interesting point of view ... welcome aboard. To some extent I also am of the opinion that pipe smoking is an activity of the past, on the verge of extinction. On the other hand, the golden age of pipe tobacco and blending seems to be ... today. My grandfather smoked one blend of tobacco and owned maybe a couple or three pipes his whole life. This is not because he was ignorant, but because his village tobacco shop - or better yet, the small convenience store that also sold tobacco only carried one or two blends (not even sure they were blends, it was just your Carpathian cigarette tobacco in ribbon cut). Information travels very fast today, and forums facilitate a self learning experience for each pipe smoker in accord with the time and money they decide to put into it. So if you have a moderate budget for this hobby, you can experience tobacco in a way that was not possible in the past. To this end ... if this party is at its end, they sure serve the best booze in its final hours - not sure how long that is going to last though ...

 

perdurabo

Lifer
Jun 3, 2015
3,305
1,575
Bromano, Welcome aboard! I like your style. I look at the post to your Orignial Post and I can see why pipes and tobacco are being seized from us by the Big Leviathan called Government. We are complacent here in America and I believe it much more the case abroad. I think these are exciting times. How long will the individual weather dystopia? How long will the individual allow his fellow neighbor to regulate him through the hand of Government? Then cry foul as they try to blame the MONOPOLY of a Marriage between Big Business and Government(Cronyism), which they helped create. Bromano you're not late to the party, the party just started. My question is How many will have the strength to fight on or who will fall off like flies by the Big Blue Neon Light?
Enjoy a pipe and cellar deep until enough wake up from their drunken stupor. :puffpipe:

 
Mar 1, 2014
3,646
4,916
To a certain extent I still envy the old timers.

It seems to me that the old OTC blends are formulated specifically to be very low maintenance and easy burning, pretty much exactly what I need. I have to question whether blend variety wasn't still largely limited by choice.
I'm not doubting the lack of variety in the average small town, but somewhere along the line the selection was narrowed to preferring a specific type of tobacco, and eventually that's all that was delivered.

I don't know if it's my age, genetics, or lack of willingness to burn my mouth, but with the way filters and "lack of bite" have been promoted so heavily as main selling points to any pipe related product over the last century, I get the impression that from a historical perspective I'm not the only one who considers pipe smoking somewhat masochistic.

And in the end Aromatics still make up 90% of pipe tobacco sales today.

 

bromano

Lurker
Mar 3, 2017
8
0
Thank, everyone for the kind answers and warmth welcoming.
I think it's a fair assessment to say that old timers (aka people from “Golden Age” of Pipe Smoking, 50s, 60s) had a more open and tolerant environment to cultivate this alluring hobby. As it has been well said before, they had, on the other side, enormous limitations regarding access to knowledge, community sharing, blends available, quality pipes and so on. To sum up, it is a world we’ll never know (or most of us), available only through black and white pictures and funny vintage ads. It’s like picking your hat every time you leave your home or polishing your shoe downtown while reading a newspaper: gone with the wind.
In our days, the heyday of internet, e-commerce, specialty and DIY, pipe smoking does seem to surprise us every day with new attractive things. From my limited point of view (Brazilian), I’m starting to understand what that means. It is nice, though mostly inaccessible to us. However, it still disturbs me that pipe smokers are running against very powerful interests. I can’t think of other man-hobby’s that find itself in similar situation.
Anyway, we should move on, I agree, and keep the party running. I’m happy to join.
Bromano you're not late to the party, the party just started. My question is How many will have the strength to fight on or who will fall off like flies by the Big Blue Neon Light?
Thanks for your answer, my friend. I was about to write some provoking things about how docile Americans have become to government intervention since the Age of the Founders, but you robbed me of my argument. That was nice.
You see, I often praise american revolutionary values in the classes I teach to young Brazilian kids, and they, of course, become curious to one day see how things are out there. Don’t let them down, lads!

 

perdurabo

Lifer
Jun 3, 2015
3,305
1,575
American Revolutionary Values are now considered Racist, you won't find many here with an interest in Liberty or Americanism. Stay away from the political/Tax/FDA threads for awhile. Politics is forbidden here, unless it's about tobacco regulation. Don't mention Democrat or Republican. Or Brazilian Politics for that matter. Keep it philosophical and you might be ok.
As far as pipes and tobacco? There's a wealth of knowledge to find here. A lot of joking around and Kevin and Co run an exceptional site.

 

plugugly

Starting to Get Obsessed
Mar 9, 2015
280
32
I don't think the party is over at all! Madox07 said it. It's really the best of times for this hobby. They aren't putting the chairs up on the table at all. In fact, the band is cranking the dancing's getting dirty and while the Feds might just raid the speakeasy, right now, it's one hell of a party!
Plugugly

 

deathmetal

Lifer
Jul 21, 2015
7,714
32
To a young newcomer like me, it’s much like arriving at the end of the party, when people are turning the chairs on top of tables, the music is done playing, and the floor is a mess.
This is the condition of the Western world in general and has been for some time, which is why many older artistic movements identified with this melancholy you feel. History is not a pendulum, but a cycle, and things are changing. Take heart and enjoy boldly!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjhRi4uJ-5c

 

ophiuchus

Lifer
Mar 25, 2016
1,557
2,052
This is all so tough to predict. We may see tobacco use pretty much disappear in the next quarter century. We may also see a huge, angry, vindictive backlash against the anti-tobacco movement as the torches and pitchforks go clamoring towards the next cultural villain. But welcome, bromano; you may be late to the party, but you also may become part of that backlash. :puffy:

 

deathmetal

Lifer
Jul 21, 2015
7,714
32
We may also see a huge, angry, vindictive backlash against the anti-tobacco movement as the torches and pitchforks go clamoring towards the next cultural villain.
It may even be bigger than that. The anti-fun movement has overplayed its hand, and those who enjoy tobacco, booze, fireworks, driving fast, hunting, BASE jumping and full-fat salad dressing will have their day.

 
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