Snow Melt

Lung Cancer and My Grandfather

One of my grandfather's died of lung cancer. Grandpa Newland said began smoking when he was 13 years old. When he started smoking there were no filter cigarettes. When Grandpa began smoking he had to roll his own smokes. Grandpa continued to roll his own cigarettes for years.

I can remember sitting at the kitchen table and watching him roll a cigarette. He would remove a cigarette paper from it package and then lay it on the table. Then he would open the can of tobacco and take out a pinch with his thumb and for finger. After that he spread the tobacco on the cigarette paper. He would look at it for a few minutes to determine if there were enough tobacco on the paper. Sometimes he would add more and sometimes he would remove a little. When he had enough tobacco on the paper then he rolled the paper around the tobacco and licked the paper with his tongue. The last thing he did was twist the ends of the paper.

When Grandpa began smoking the danger weren't well known and by the time the dangers were know it was too late for him to stop. I watched the cancer eat away at his lungs and eventually his brain. I sat by his hospital bed as he lay dying. I was in the room when he took his last breath. I think Grandpa was in his seventies when he died and at that time he was considered an old man. If Grandpa had never started smoking or had been able to quite he would have add years to his life. Years he could have spent enjoying his grandchildren.

Smoking causes cancer, it waste lives, effects families and marriages. Grandma never smoked. Grandma was allergic to the smoke of cigarettes, but she and Grandpa were married fifty years. I never remember my grandparents sleeping in the same bed. Grandpa had his own bed and his own room, with a door that he could close so he could smoke. As a child I didn't consider why they never slept in the same bed or how that affected their marriage, but now I wonder.