Cigars

The smell of a cigar—actually the smell of a Roi-Tan—never failed to bring back memories of the Owyhee County Fair in Homedale, Idaho. It was most noticeable in the stock barns as I followed my father around looking at horses, prize steers, pigs and sheep; but you could also catch a whiff during the rodeo. A distinctive smell, not at all unpleasant in the open air. That was, of course, decades ago before political correctness and smoke-Nazis ruled the country. In those days if you didn’t like the smell of the cigar you moved upwind if he, the smoker, was there first. And if you thought to light a cigar, you asked your neighbors immediately downwind if it would bother them. (Four seats away was where “immediate” ended.)

I guess you could say that those whiffs of cigar smoke led me to be the unapologetic cigar smoker I am today because those years were a magical time in my life. Actually, all my family, except for me, smoked cigarettes and I never did like the smell. But cigars were different. They filled the air not with a stale smoke but one that you could roll around in your nostrils and enjoy.

Of course, today I don’t smoke Roi-Tans as the brand went the way of the Studebaker just last year when the Selma, Alabama, plant closed. My tastes run to Arturo Fuentes, Rocky Patel and CAO. But once in a while I catch the distinctive odor of a cigar that smells like a Roi-Tan and it instantly takes me back to 1959, hot summer days, cool summer nights, new Wrangler jeans, boots, snap Levi western shirts and straw cowboy hats.

My evening cigar is my time alone these days. For an hour I sit outside with coffee or whisky and a cigar while I contemplate the events of the day, the week and Washington with its foibles, factions and frictions. It’s a time of reflection and thought interrupted only by my 3-year old daughter’s laughter or her banging on the window to get my attention. It’s a time that obviously only occurs in good weather because as much as I enjoy my daily cigar I don’t desire to suffer as I pay my respects to the artisan on a far-away shore that created it by hand from loose leaves of tobacco.

My evening cigar is also a celebration of my freedom of choice. I don’t smoke because I must to keep my nerves calm nor do I have an insatiable desire to sit alone. But I do enjoy my daily cigar and count it lucky if I have the time for a second. I believe that all men and women should celebrate the individual freedom of choice in some small way at least once a day.

There are those who oppose individual freedoms if it isn’t their choice of a proper individual freedom (whatever that is). I pity them not only for their lack of tolerance of their fellow man but also for their lack of appreciation of other people’s freedom. I know that should those people ever gain the power to do so, they will move to stop all that they deem inappropriate. And that will lead to their own downfall as it will only be a matter of time until someone stronger, but with different tastes, deposes them and eliminates their own favorite freedoms.

Individual freedom is a precious thing that all too often we take it for granted whether it be a cigar, the 1st Amendment or the 2nd Amendment or any of the Bill of Rights. And the only way to keep those freedoms is to celebrate them at every opportunity for a freedom not used is soon lost.

I’ve been writing much about the proposed health care bill (HR 3200). It is troubling legislation constructed with broad yet obtuse language that allows for interpretation by those with the power to make decisions. Decisions that could well limit the personal freedoms of all Americans depending on the mindset of those appointed to execute the bill should it become law.

The questions for all of us are clear: Do we trust those whom we have never met and will never personally know with our personal freedom? And can we expect our freedom of choice to be respected once this bill is enacted?

Without addressing the arguments of cost, impact on the national debt and rationing, I am wary of the bill because of the hurried manner in which it was rushed through the House. Moreover, I am wary of the current Administration not because they have stated that they wish to effect a change in our country; but because the change they propose is covered by smoke and mirrors. Vague platitudes and speeches coupled with broad, over-reaching legislation bodes ill for the personal freedoms that were handed down from our forefathers. Those are freedoms that I cherish.

The rights we hold dear were not given to us by a government, but, as it indicates in the Declaration of Independence, by a higher power. I urge all to contact the members of their Congressional delegation and their Senators with their own views on the pending legislation. Use your right to speak to preserve your personal freedom—your God given rights—as you see them.