Bad Days for Bumming Smokes Bad Days for Bumming ...

Ever-increasing state and city cigarette taxes, together of course with the ban, have changed New York smokers' lives and habits in a number of obvious ways. We're all aware of that, but there have also been quieter, more subtle changes that you might not recognize if you're not, well, one of us.

For one, fewer and fewer bodegas are selling loose smokes. Time was, if you didn't have enough for a full pack, you could still stop in to a bodega and buy a couple of loose cigarettes for 10 to 25 cents each. Not many places offer that option anymore.

At the same time, cheap black-market smokes are becoming more plentiful and easier to find. Dealers with plastic bags slung over their shoulders whisper their way through midtown, scoping out the crowds of smokers gathered on the sidewalks outside office buildings. Some don't even bother being subtle about it anymore. One afternoon just last week in Park Slope, an old man was selling black-market smokes off a card table he'd set up on 7th Ave.

"You won't find 'em any cheaper," he promised passers-by. He was probably right, too, with his prices running an average of $4 less per pack than any other (legitimate) shop in the neighborhood.

There also seems to be a strange evolutionary shift taking place in the minds of smokers and nonsmokers alike. Smokers used to be outcasts?and in a way they still are. But in being forced onto the sidewalks outside of bars and restaurants (a number of people have commented upon this), they've taken to creating their own communities, their own networks. Those who choose to continue smoking under current restrictions are almost becoming a breed of valiant freedom fighters. At least in the minds of some. It parallels a little too closely the development of the "good/bad" and "good/evil" distinction Nietzsche described in his On the Genealogy of Morals.

In another direct parallel, Morgan noted recently that it's the nonsmokers who must be starting to feel like the real outcasts. They're the ones who are left sitting alone at the table or the bar when all the smokers head outside to have a cigarette while they continue the conversation.

One of the most interesting changes, I've noticed, has been in the simple act of bumming a smoke. Bumming smokes used to be so easy. Friends did it, strangers did it and of course, bums did it. It was easier than asking for a quarter, and usually got a better response. You ask for a smoke, there's not much doubt concerning what's going to be done with that smoke?unlike spare change, which could be used to buy coffee, sure, but might also be used to buy crack or Thunderbird or hookers.

Nowadays, though, with the price of a pack of cigarettes topping out at more than $7 in the city, and with still more taxes on the way, things have changed. Cigarettes are a much more precious and valuable commodity. They need to be preserved, protected?even hoarded.

So here's the problem: With the city artificially inflating the cost of a pack of smokes, they're being priced out of the range of what most people would be able (or willing) to pay?hence dramatically increasing the number of cigarette bummers out there on the streets. At the same time, those of us who still buy smokes are less willing to part with them that easily anymore. We're much more likely to ignore smoke bummers in much the same way we ignore the panhandlers.

Which has led to another change in the smoker/smoke bummer transaction.

Two years ago, say?maybe I'm being generous there?perhaps one bummer in six would offer you a little change in exchange for a cigarette. A dime or 15 cents?something akin to what they'd pay for a loose one at the bodega. The rest simply took it for free, and expected there to be no trouble as a result. There rarely was. It was just the way things worked.

Today, asking a stranger for a free cigarette is out of the question. What's more, a dime or 15 cents won't cut it, either. In recent weeks, I've seen single cigarettes go for anything from a quarter (which is still cheap, considering) to a dollar.

Even the language of the transaction has changed. You don't hear, "Can I bum a smoke off you?" these days nearly so often as you hear, "Can I buy a smoke off you?"

I tend to be sympathetic toward the smoke bummers?but at the same time, I'm torn. On the one hand, I feel compelled to be generous, having known what it was like to go without. We're brothers in arms, after all. What's more, handing out cigarettes has helped me avoid more than one rough scrape in the past. On the other hand, though, yeah, I also feel compelled to keep a careful eye on my supply. These things don't come cheap, and they need to last me.

Here's how it usually works. First bummer who stops me in the morning and offers to pay for a smoke, I hand him one and wave the money away. But that's it for the day?except for special circumstances, everyone else gets a shrug, and I hang on to my smokes.

This can lead to problems, especially with the rules having changed the way they have.

It was an overcast and damp morning. There was something heavy in the air. It was about quarter to seven, and I hadn't been off the train for 30 seconds before the first one stopped me,

"Can I buy a smoke from you?" he asked. I nodded silently, slid one from the pack and handed it to him. He borrowed my lighter, lit up, thanked me as he handed it back. I waved his coins away, and we both continued walking. He was clearly pretty drunk, but sometimes that's when you need it the most.

Turning the corner onto 7th, another man asked if he could buy a smoke. I kept walking. Then, as I was approaching 25th St., yet another man asked me.

"I'm sorry," I said, lifting my arms in a gesture of futility, "I've already handed out my quota."

"But I said I'd buy it!" he yelled.

I kept walking, and he kept yelling after me. "I told you I'd buy it from you! Didn't you hear me? Dammit! I said I was gonna pay you!"

The rest of the day continued in much the same manner. Nearly every block, no matter where or in what direction I was heading, someone was asking to buy a cigarette from me, and most all of them became furious when I didn't come through. These were clearly desperate times.

The next morning, I was both prepared and wary as I left the subway station and began walking toward the office. I envisioned myself trapped in a scene like the one near the end of A Clockwork Orange, where the gang of elderly bums kicks the shit out of Malcolm McDowell.

I made it to the corner of 7th and turned north without being asked once. In fact, I made it up to 28th St. before the Middle Eastern kid appeared out of nowhere.

"I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry!" he shouted. I turned to see him running my way, waving a dollar.

"Please," he said, when I stopped. "Please? I'm sorry?" he held the dollar out towards me, and I began reaching for it. I had no idea what was going on?I just figured this guy was giving me a dollar.

"No," he said. "Cigarette. Please. I'm sorry. Dollar."

I shrugged. First of the day. I pulled a smoke from my pocket, handed it to him, and waved the dollar away. As I turned to continue walking, he stopped me again.

"No," he said. "One for my friend, too."

I looked, and sure enough, an older Middle Eastern man was leaning up against the building. He waved at me.

I shrugged again, sighed, and reached into my pocket.