Cohiba

When I was a kid, mostly in the 50’s, I’d taste the beer my dad would have while watching the Brooklyn Dodgers and wonder what he liked about it; it was just bitter to me. And when he started pouring a scotch on the rocks when he got home from work or the golf course, I tasted that and couldn’t understand what he could be thinking; it just burned all the way down my throat. My father didn’t smoke by then, but my uncle Joe would come over to play pinochle with him and smoke a big, stinky cigar, which I thought was completely disgusting; I couldn’t stand that smell.

Then I grew up. I came to appreciate some of the very things I couldn’t understand as a child. I enjoy a beer on a hot day or at a sports bar, and Chivas Regal and water is my drink of choice when I’m having more than one. And I actually savor the smell of a good cigar and have been known to have a puff or two on occasion—witness this picture of me in the late 90’s. So the subject of my last smoke painting in this series is a fine, premium Cohiba—no stogie or cheroot for me! You can tell what a good cigar it is by that perfect ash on its end and that sweet smoke streaming up to the sky. An acquired taste…