Dear Reader,
I invite you to temporarily disavow that which can be readily observed, for exactitudes have limited applicability in the domain of the transcendental.
One may find it paradoxical that an agricultural product honed to perfection by hundreds of years of trial and error could be a gateway to meaningful abstractions unencumbered by any physical limitations of being human.
Put another way, cigars can expand the human capacity to understand.
Whosoever finds themselves sitting on the beach at night smoking their favorite vitola is intimately familiar with this phenomenon. Having experienced it myself many times, I recently planned to partake again for the balance of an entire weekend. I curated a selection of my favorite Privada cigars: BBQ Pig, Odd Job, Batista, Fruit leather, Murder Hornet, and Trail Mix.
Having planted myself just out of reach of the lapping coastline with nothing but the pastel light of the moon to navigate my selection, I would smoke myself into a state of mind where the meaningful distinctions between cigars, campfires, and stars disappear with only the ocean breeze to tether me to reality. Thoughts leading on to thoughts and so on. I could explore love, gratitude, nostalgia, and any number of wholesome notions that make one feel like the universe is a cacophony of threads woven together to create a canvas of human happiness.
I could have.
I would have.
Instead, my car broke down at exit 108 – about 40 miles from Ormand beach.
In place of contemplating the unity of nature, I spent the next three hours trying to get my car towed. Then there was pulling apart my engine the following day. I replaced my alternator through a series of expletive inducing obstacles and reassembled the power-steering, fans, and radiator. I breathed an audible sigh of relief when my engine turned over. After washing my hands, I pulled a farm-rolled San Lotano out of my humidor and walked into my backyard to celebrate. I thought of nothing in particular. I was present, and I let the cigar put my mind at peace. Is there a meaningful distinction between a cigar, a campfire, a star, or even the combustion of a car engine? I don’t know and I am not sure it matters, but I am reminded of the wisdom found in Emily Dickenson’s poem “Fire.”
Ashes denote that fire was;
Respect the grayest pile
For the departed creature’s sake
That hovered there awhile.
Fire exists the first in light,
And then consolidates,
Only the chemist can disclose
Into what carbonates.