Entry 1

Cigarettes are not good for you. We know this. It’s a fact that’s been beaten into our heads since our tender youths and we get it. Yes, cigarettes cause cancer. Yes, cigarettes will make you look like a leather couch by the age of 35. Yes, cigarettes make you smell gross. Yes, cigarettes make your teeth look like sweet corn. Yes, cigarettes are addictive and yes, cigarettes are the bane of the working class existence. But for all of the bad things that cigarettes have to offer, there is just one thing; one very important, near and dear to me thing that makes all of the above null and void in my mind—conversation.
I am one of those unfortunate saps whose schedule forbids me much of a social life. I live, eat, breathe, and sleep work and school with the occasional rock show or party thrown in the mix for good measure, but for the most part I am either sitting in front of a computer writing, listening to lectures on campus (Monday through Friday!), at work, or sleeping. That’s my life. The small fragment of a social life that I do have, however, revolves around one place on campus… that place being the Classroom Medical smoke hut.
I never really knew what kept me coming back. When I first started at IPFW I would make a quick stop in the hut, puff away for a few minutes, then make my way to class ready to sit through yet another hour and fifteen minute lecture on god knows what. Class ends, fifteen minute break between, quick stop at hut, repeat. Then, for a reason at the time unbeknownst to me, I started showing up to school earlier and earlier each day. One day it dawned on me why—people.
The random collage of individuals I would have small talk with at the smoke hut slowly but surely ended up working their way into my friend circle. We exchanged personal information about each other. We talked about our days. We talked about work. We talked about school. We talked about love, life, misery, politics, antics and whatever else we saw fit on that particular occasion. We joked, laughed, griped, and complained. All over what, you may ask? Cigarettes. For me, coffee and cigarettes, but cigarettes were and still are the common bond.
These are some of the most interesting people that I’ve met in my entire life thus far. These are their stories. These are the goings on. These are the Smoke Hut Diaries.