As a long time smoker, I remember a lot of things back in the day before the elec cigarette came out. The differences are like night and day both in mind and body.

I first started smoking in 1969 as a 12 year old. I had been watching commercials on TV all of my life about how cool smoking was. Some ads would say that Camels were the #1 doctors' choice of cigarettes. Some people would even walk a mile for a Camel. Salems were said to give you fresh breath. People who smoked Tareyton would rather fight than switch, and Winston tasted good like a cigarette should. With Virginia Slim, you knew you came a long way baby. Gee, I even saw Fred, Barney, Wilma, and Betty smoking them. Man, you weren't in the groove if you didn't smoke.

When I first started, all of my friends were smoking, and, if I wanted to be part of the crowd, I needed to learn how to smoke. I was only 12 years old, so I didn't know the health risks. I just wanted to be cool, so my friends would like me and let me hang out with them. A pack of smokes costed me 27 cents. I would pull my little red wagon around looking for pop bottles and take them to the store, so I could get my pack of fags. That is what they were called back then. There was a big difference being 12 in the 1950's than there is today. 12 year old girls don't pull wagons around town anymore, but that was what I did back then, and no one thought anything about it. When I first started smoking, I though it would be very easy to do until my girlfriend told me that I had to breathe the smoke into my lungs or else I wasn't really smoking. When I first tried this, I fell to the floor choking. My friend just walked out of the house without saying a word. I knew that I had just flunked the test, and that I must learn this new task. So I practiced everyday just taking very small puffs and breathing it in. This took several months for me to complete, before I could inhale a full puff. Needless to say, I was considered a child by the other kids, so I couldn't hang out with them, until I could prove that I had grown up by being able to smoke. Wow! I can't believe how naive I was.

The years went by and I got really good at smoking, I was accepted into the crowd. I was a grown up. We would run all the way to school everyday. I loved to run. I could run like a deer, at least that is what I felt like. I loved running as much as I liked smoking. Time went on and running started becoming harder and harder for me to do. I just lost all the energy to do it, and I couldn't run near as far or as fast as I could in the past. This got harder every year, until, finally, I just stopped running all together. I knew it was either give up the cigarettes or give up running.

By this time, cigarettes had become a big part of my life. I felt a strong urge to keep smoking, so I finally just gave up running altogether. Well, it has been a long time now, and I just kept smoking. I now know how dangerous smoking cigarettes are, but when you have been smoking as long as I have, it is very hard to quit. I have wanted to quit for years now, but had no will power. I have read a lot of things that are supposed to help you quit smoking, but most of these articles, I believe, were written by non smokers. What it boiled down to in the end was me using my will power that I did not have, or if I did have it at first, my addiction would win every time. I tried about everything on the market to help me kick the habit, but nothing worked for me. The urge to smoke was just too strong, and I never was able to give them up. I started smoking this new cigarette on the internet now called the electronic cigarette. I have been smoking it exclusively for 8 months now, and I have not missed smoking the real cigarettes, because this elec cig feels just like the real thing. When I draw on the filter, I actually taste something, and there is a vapor that comes from it that looks just like smoke. I heard President Obama on the news the other day saying that they have found no health risks with the electronic cigarettes as of yet, but he was sure that they would sooner or later. Well, I'm not a doctor, but I just know how I feel about this new cigarette. I feel better than I have in years, and now I am starting to be able to run again. I really don't think they are as bad as the real cigarettes. This is experience talking.