Erin

Mom was always a smoker. In my earliest memories of her there is always a thin stream of grey smoke cutting vertically upwards. With cigarettes, she was brand loyal. It was always Marlboro reds. Not 100's like her sister, or lights like my sisters and I later in life, just the regular Marlboro reds. With everything else; soup, laundry detergent, lunch meat, she'd buy what was on sale or that she had a coupon for. Mom was thrifty and knew how to stretch a dollar. A useful skill in my childhood home. Not that we were poor; but we were careful. You had what you needed, not much more; which is why it was particularly galling to her when we decided to go to war against smoking.

I'm not even sure how it all started. Maybe we heard some adults talking about it? Maybe an item on the AM news station the Grandma always played? "News and weather on the 8's!" Regardless, at some point, we learned smoking was bad. Not just bad, but BAD! Like stealing and lying...and not little white lies...big fat fibs that get you sent to your room without dinner. The first volley involved the magazines. I don't remember anyone buying or reading magazines in our house, but they were there. Lying on the coffee table by the avocado green velvet sofa in the living room. Paging through them, we searched for the ads. Cowboys on horses. Thin women taking a break from tennis. All smoking. And at the bottom of each ad was that little rectangular box with the plain text warning from the surgeon general. I assume it was meant to be inconspicuous, but it was the only thing that stood out to us. We cut them out with our brightly colored, blunt-ended scissors and relocated them. To the medicine cabinet, the bedroom mirror, on the cans of Del Monte green beans in the kitchen cabinet; anywhere we thought it was least expected and had to be noticed. We were C. Everett Koop's little soldiers. We were determined. So, when that didn't work, we escalated to destruction. We flushed them. We dug holes and buried them. We broke them and put them back in the pack. That second battle did not last long. And we did not win. The cause wasn't worth the punishment.

Eventually each of us picked up the habit as well, but Mom was the pro. We all knew she collected Marlboro Bucks. We saved ours for her too. Cleaning out the house, we came upon boxes and boxes of red and white stuff, most of it never used. Decks of cards, fleece blankets, sweatshirts, duffel bags, and this red and white Coleman thermos. It was one of the few things I took after she died. My sisters thought it was weird, that I felt sentimental about something mom got for free and never used. I threw out letters, refused furniture, and kept the plastic Marlboro thermos.

I don't smoke any more. None of us do. I don't use the thermos either. It's in the back of a kitchen cupboard that I rarely go into. I happen upon it occasionally and think about Mom. About how she always saved things she didn't use. About the thermos that she'd fill with red Kool-Aid for back yard picnics. Holding the thermos, I can recall the smell smoke from a freshly lit cigarette and it's like she just left the room. That she's just around the corner.