I started on my 12 birthday—my 3rd Leap Year birthday—in 1948. I thought it made me look more sophisticated, debonair and grown up. 48 years later, on July 21, 2008, I was being lead into the operating room to have an aorta valve replacement.

I started off smoking 2-3 cigarettes a day and at the age of 16 when I was going to the bars I was up to a pack a day. While in the Marines I cut back a bit but by the time I went to work as a server (called waiters back then!) in restaurants I was smoking 2-3 packs a day and would for the next 40 years until that July day when, before going into the operating room, I smoked my last cigarette and now it is 9 years since.

I have not smoked since then and being around smokers doesn’t bother me at all. I still miss a cigarette now and then like when I am on the computer or after a good meal but that only lasts for a second or two.