Deciding to Start Smoking a Pipe

How does one decide to begin smoking a pipe? Did someone from their past smoke a pipe, someone they respected and wants to emulate? Did they observe a stranger smoking a pipe and think to themselves, that looks interesting?  Perhaps the potential pipe smoker is trying to quit those nasty cigarettes or chewing tobacco and is hoping the pipe can help free themselves from bondage?

Every pipe smoker at some point in their life had to have made a conscious decision to pick up a pipe and begin down a path of failures and rewards. The failures, come as a  result of not knowing anything about smoking a pipe and experiencing such things as tongue bite, leather tongue, hell's’ furnace, terrible tobacco blends and a multitude of other unpleasantries to cause the now tortured soul to pitch the fire breather out the window to never consider picking one up again.

The rewards come with learning how to correctly smoke a pipe and the wonderful and pleasurable experiences that come from sitting in a favorite spot, reading a favorite author, watching the tip of a fishing pole or just contemplating life itself.  There is an unexplainable satisfaction that only a pipe can bring, and only those who are patient enough to learn how to handle the briar can relate to these written words. The majority of pipe smokers if asked who they would choose to sit and enjoy an afternoon with would more than likely choose their favorite pipe loaded with their favorite blend.

If you are a beginning pipe smoker and don’t want to experience the common failures but instead would prefer to skip right along to the rewards, you only need to do one thing, slow down!! Almost every new pipe smoker, myself included couldn’t wait to experience all these fantastic pleasures that they have heard or read so much about so they get in a hurry and don’t learn or practice the basics. The old adage you have to crawl before you walk rings very true in pipe smoking.

If you’re going to be a serious pipe guy, there is a few things you’re going to need in order to do it correctly the first time out of the gate, these are the basics.

• Quality Pipes
• Quality Tobaccos
• Tampers
• Lighters

If you noticed I pluralized everything on the list due to the fact that you you will indeed need multiples of everything in order to enjoy your pipe. You have to rest and rotate pipes, one tobacco is always boring, tampers and lighters are like damned socks that get lost or misplaced every time you turn around.

I will attempt to write a beginners guide to pipe smoking and expound on other sub-topics that I hope you will find helpful