Smoking may be a pretty cheap means of stress reduction and aid to conviviality. I used to smoke and when I quit I became aware of a heightened sense of social awkwardness. Smoking may not make one suave but it seems to distract from awareness of the awkwardness. I remember going to Seattle in 1974 with my then wife who was attending a meeting of the "IS". I walked into the meeting hall with her and was amazed that people could actually survive in a room that contained so much smoke. I took the smoke as an index of the anxiety level that would have prevailed if those folks didn't smoke (not to mention if they had just quit smoking). Tom Walker Sandwichman and Deconsultant Bowen Island, BC
