Smoking books
By Tyler Jane Barley

On average, I read three books a week. I usually reserve a couple hours a day for reading. In that time I can read about 125 pages of hard nonfiction (scholarly stuff like you'd find in a textbook), 200 pages of soft nonfiction (trashy tell-all autobiographies, sports memoirs or lifestyles of the rich and oversexed) or 250 pages of fiction in that amount of time.

Not being a person of enormous means, I get these books at the local library. I generally check out four books a week. See, I usually check out at least one hard nonfiction book that doesn't do much but prove its point, over and over again. How many times do I have to read that pornography isn't responsible for all the ills of society. Hell, I already agree with the author. No need to preach to this choir, so I rarely finish such books.

I've noticed a troubling trend, though. Each week, at least one of the books I check out has an overpowering residue of tobacco smoke. This wouldn't be a horrible problem, except that old tobacco smoke, even moreso than the stuff freely emitted from cigarettes, gives me massive headaches. I checked out the latest David Brin book earlier this year, and I literally had to air the thing out for six days and then speed read it on the seventh before I turned it in.

This also happened with the final installment in Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy and plenty of other sci-fi books. As the St. Pete public library doesn't stock much sci-fi (and I love the stuff), this presents a problem.

It doesn't stop with sci-fi, either. Any book I check out that has to do with drugs (like the excellent Smoke and Mirrors) is similarly tainted. I'm currently reading a slim volume called Buzz, about the historical search for meaning in alcohol and caffeine. As I am more than a casual user of both, I figured this would be a good read.

It is, but my friend the smoker got to the thing first. In fact, I have come to a few conclusions on the subject of my smoking friend.

First, if this person did not smoke I would probably be married to him or her, as our interests so neatly dovetail. Second, this person must have real connections with the library staff, because he/she always gets to the books I want before I can read them. Always. And third, I've got to find a better way to air out books than spread them between two chairs face down, holding them in place with a large squash on each side.

I'm sure you think that since people just smoke more in the south, I'm being silly to think that all these tainted books are the result of one person's insensitivity to the tobacco challenged. But I've been checking out books for years, and this has never happened before. Alright, so the Curious George books are a bit slim to ponder over with a dangling butt. I do read books without pictures, too. I've lived in three other major cities, and nothing like this has ever happened. Before moving to St. Pete, the scent of any book never made me physically ill.

So it is one person, and that person visits the main branch of the St. Pete Library. I'm thinking of staking out the new releases stacks, marking the books I find interesting and waiting to see who checks them out. I'll follow the person outside, and if they reach for a cigarrette as soon as the doors slide shut, I'll know I have my mate. I'll offer to sleep with them immediately, as long as they promise to brush their teeth and not smoke until we're done with the deed.

Or maybe not. I've always wondered what it would be like to have sex with an octogenarian, but I'm not that curious. And perhaps my proposal would spark some sort of health care emergency, like the time I asked my grandpa if he had a pencil in his pocket or was he just happy to see me.

I'm conflicted here. Can my love of books (and love of certain sorts of books) translate into a serious relationship and the possibility of good sex? Can I stop one more fool from becoming a casualty of Sir Walter's legacy? Too many questions. I'm beginning to understand why my bookmate smokes.

Tyler Jane Barley doesn't smoke tobacco. That's all she's saying on the subject of smoking. Period.

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