Everything Old is New Again
When I moved here in the 60’s, I saw something I don’t think I had ever seen before. It wasn’t unusual to see someone sit at a park bench or maybe a cafe table and pull out a pouch of cut loose leaves. They’d sprinkle some onto neatly creased tobacco paper, roll it lengthwise, lick the edge of the paper to seal it and then smoke their hand-rolled cigarette. Some did the rolling very precisely. Others were a little more free-form. I remember tobacco brands like Players and Cutters. Players Navy Cut had an image of an old-time sailor on the package.
What I mainly remember is that the roll-your-own set was almost exclusively older males. At that time, I saw older males as anyone about 40 and above. I can still see them in their tweed jackets and wool herringbone caps, hunched over against the weather, rolling up their cigarettes. Or perhaps it would be a laborer in his v-necked string tee shirt and bad teeth, sitting by his cup of tea. You could even find the posh professional in his bowler hat and velvet collared overcoat doing the same.
This would have been the generation that had fought in, or at least lived through World War II. It would have been a time of rationing in the country, or maybe sitting behind the front lines somewhere on a European battlefield where you made due with what was available. Regardless, they were certainly from an era before pre-rolled cigarettes became commonplace in England. By the 60’s, the younger generations and many women had adopted pre-rolled cigarettes. It was just the vets, laborers and pensioners that seemed to cling to those older habits.
In 2019, those 40+ year olds of 1965 are now 90+ year olds. Probably not many of them smoking any more. Sure enough, nowhere have I seen an older person smoking a self rolled cigarette. But sitting in a pub recently and looking down the bar, I was astonished to see a twenty-something year old women methodically pour out loose leaf tobacco onto a rolling paper, roll it up, lick and seal it. Then, she proceeded to do the same for her friend next to her. I thought, how strange, I never would have expected to see that again. At least now they have to go outside to actually smoke.
The the very day, there on a street corner was another twenty- or thirty-something year old man rolling up his cigarette. And I’ve seen it another time during our stay here. I guess it really does prove the point that nothing ever does really die out. Just wait long enough and it comes back around again.
“The thing that hath been, it is that which shall be; and that which is done is that which shall be done: and there is no new thing under the sun.” Ecclesiastes 1:9