by Isadora Epstein

Letter 4

Concerning Amanda Coogan’s Smoking in Bolero

Dear Smokers,

I am sorry I left you to become yet another one of the boring non-smoking populace. You were so glorious at smoking, it made me really quite nostalgic. Us quitters always are though. And there you were—

Smoking in the way we had always imagined we had smoked.

Very triumphantly and very attractively and yet still so nonchalantly.

By passing your cigarettes around very slyly, you all seemed in on the secret that you had at last formed some sort of utopic smoking area.

That was the way smoking was always meant to be. Watching your perfect smoking, I was standing between the two prime smoking demographics: teenagers and French people.

Both the teenagers and the French people were supporting you. I couldn’t really understand what the French people were saying, but luckily the word cigarette is reasonably translatable. One of the teenagers raised a Smirnoff Ice in your honor while smoking a cigarette, which I believe is a sign of respect in their culture.

Also with my respect and admiration,

Isadora