This says it all.

I lost a friend to lung cancer last week. In the 1980s, she was my director for a number of community theatre musicals. On March 18th of this year I received an email from her through that theatre’s Yahoogroups list, thanking all of us for birthday wishes and signed, “Love to all!” It’s five months later, and she’s dead. A vibrant, life-loving woman in her 70s, gone.

Maybe people in their 20s, 30s and 40s (according to Gallup, the largest group of smokers) think that when they’re older they won’t treasure life as much. How can we make young smokers understand that, at 75, they will want to live active, energetic lives just as passionately as they do now? Maybe that cognitive leap isn’t possible. Tobacco companies are banking on that inability to see as a 20-something just how desperately you will cling to life as an elder — and just how worthwhile life will be.

When I heard what my friend had died of, I Googled “what is it like to die of lung cancer?” and read an About.com article with growing horror. Nonstop coughing, gasping for breath, increasing weakness, decreased appetite and weight loss, confusion and, of course this: “It’s very likely that you will experience pain in your final stages of lung cancer.” Severe pain, as the cancer spreads to your chest and spine bones. If you smoke, think of someone you love very much experiencing those symptoms. Unbearable, right? Please love yourself enough not to want the same for you.

And, by the way, I’m not just, well…blowing smoke. I get that puffing can be awesome and quitting can be hell. I was a pack-a-day smoker for 20 years before quitting cold turkey at age 35. I was motivated by an article I’d read about a little girl with cystic fibrosis whose mother had to dangle her upside down and whack her back several times daily to clear her chest so the girl could breathe. I thought, “That little girl would give anything to have healthy lungs, and I’m voluntarily harming mine.” I quit the next morning.

If you want stop-smoking tips, message me. I will help.