Mommy smoked but she didn't want us to. She saw smoke coming out of the barn one time, so we got whipped.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
My mom started smoking when she was 11. She went to the hill next door to try her first cigarette. She set the entire hill on fire, but it didn't deter her.
I thought I couldn't afford to take her out and smoke as well. So I gave up cigarettes. Then I took her out and one day I looked at her and thought: 'Oh well,' and I went back to smoking again, and that was better.
One day, when we were coming back from school, we saw this big cloud of smoke coming up, and all these fire-trucks in the yard. The garage was burning down. I was 14, and we'd lost everything.
I got three whippings a day from my mama.
Mother beat the hell out of us. She'd have wild outbursts.
I saw how, when my brother smoked reefer, it made my mother cry. He was 16 at the time. And I saw that she broke down and cried. I never wanted to hurt my mother, so I kept away from drugs.
I didn't want my daughter brought up by nannies, and I didn't want her to feel I wasn't around.
My mother was a real tough cookie. She raised the three of us, and she worked at the same time.
Mom was a smoker. My grandfather was a smoker. My aunts were smokers. My uncles were smokers. I don't know any smokers now, not even my mom.
I made a very slatternly mother, notably unkeen on housework, unaware that homes need to be cleaned now and then, and too often to be found with a cigarette in one hand and a drink in the other.