3-2-1 Response To David Sedaris’ “Letting Go” - Reem

3-2-1 Response To David Sedaris’ “Letting Go”

David Sedaris writes about cigarettes like a true smoker. He wittily contradicts himself throughout the essay in order to poke fun at himself and smokers in general. His sarcasm and wit captures the way a lot of smokers actually feel about smoking so there is truth to what he is saying, but at the same time he’s making fun of himself.

His first point: contrary to popular belief, smokers are not brainwashed. He stresses that seeing smokers and ashtrays anywhere didn’t want to make him smoke and that in actuality, it made him question why anyone would ever want to do something do “fundamentally unpleasant.” As a smoker however, he describes how wonderful cigarettes are.

Point two: He discusses the customs that come with being a smoker and that mutual bond that is created with fellow smokers who may have nothing else in common besides their mutual addiction. He talks about smoking as a skill and how smoking wasn’t a statement until the anti smoking campaign came into full effect in the mid eighties, which I find hilarious. I know many smokers today (if not most) still don’t consider smoking to be some kind of “I’m cool” statement, although he admits to having contemplated his brand of choice very seriously “in the name of individuality.” Something missing was found when he began smoking. Once smoking sections were established, he says things began to change. It was when smokers began to be segregated that he noticed that one in ten of his fellow smokers or teammates had holes in their necks. Smoking is not about coolness. As a smoker, he enjoyed the rituals that come with smoking (packing and what not). Sedaris blames the heaviness he felt in his lungs while smoking more than a pack a day on his working with hazardous chemicals at the time, drawing attention to the denial and defensiveness with which many smokers defend there addiction in a tongue in cheek way.

Point three: it’s not quitting, it’s finishing. Sedaris describes the point at which he chose to become a non-smoker: he “finishes”. He says he is finished with cigarettes, preferring that term over the more common “quit” and we as readers are lead to assume that after his last smoke at the airport, he never smoked again even though he had cartons stockpiled in several different locations. He recalls a german woman who used the term “to finish” with cigarettes with fondness and writes as if recalling her statement is what made him a non-smoker. I’d like some clarification on this point when Sedaris decided to finish.

Are we really to believe that quitting something so addictive can be that easy or is that not the point at all? He relishes in the wonders of smoking and the beauty of the habit and then finishes his essay as if quitting was the easiest thing in the world and I’d like to know why that is.

Another point of clarification for me was his point about how smoking brings people who have nothing in common together. He includes an anecdote about a scary man who he felt would have robbed him had he not noticed his cigarettes and decided to ask for one instead. Sedaris describes the scene as though having a cigarette in hand saved his life from this strange man passing him on the street, but his assertion that smoking attracts “freeloaders” and also brings people together seem to be at odds with one another. His sarcasm makes it easy to see how the answer to this contradiction is that smoking does both these things, but which does he feel more strongly about?

My question is, are we responsible for the choices that we make or do we simply like to believe that we make our decisions free from outside influences?