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With a Wad of Red Man in my Cheek

MEMOIR PROJECT ROUGH DRAFT

The first rule of order as a young farm hand involved a pouch of Red Man in my pocket and a wad of chewing tobacco in my cheek. S— wouldn’t let any kid that worked with him on the farm get away without trying a chew, including M—. She didn’t take to it so well, but I did and eventually switched from Red Man to Beechnut Wintergreen. My mouth waters even today at the memories of a good chew and in 1977, the bad news about cigarettes and cancer cast a cloud of doubt over the activity of smoking and people decided it might not be a bad idea to quit smoking and some, since no one knew anything about chewing tobacco and it assumed it to be a safe alternative to smoking, started chewing instead. And since it wasn’t dangerous like cigarettes, I began chewing at age 8 with no rebuff from a single adult.

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© 2006 Christian Cloud Abraham

Posted on July 12, 2006 in
Emotion: Disgust, Type: Creative Nonfiction