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July 01, 2006
day 7
June 30, 2006
day 6
June 29, 2006
day 5
June 28, 2006
day 4
June 27, 2006
day 3

I usually do not comment on other people's life choices too often, especially my friends. But I had to share this story.

* The Bright Pink Envelope *

I sat at my desk, flipping through the piles of junk mail I had just retrieved from the mailbox. In the usual offers of free interest credit cards, solicitations to join clubs, et cetera, something caught my eye, a bright pink envelope. I tossed the others aside.

Looking at the envelope, I was mildly irritated as it was addressed to my mother who, at the age of 62, died almost three years ago. I opened the envelope to find a booklet titled "It's Time to Get Glamorous."

It was in essence, an invitation to join other women at a "Beauty Bash." However, the offer was limited to "female smokers over the age of 21."

My hand started to shake and my stomach turned when I saw that the sponsor of this event were the women of "Club Virginia Slims." I felt like I had been slapped in the face.

A flood of memories came into my mind's eye. I only wish the person who mailed this to my mother could have seen how glamorous she looked in the last days of her life.

So beautiful was the woman who modeled as a young lady, but who sat in her hospital bed, a tube coming out other lung while the doctors drained the cancerous fluid into bag after bag, as she vomited, coughed and cried.

Her 5'5" 90 lb. frame was the epitome of glamour as she lay in bed struggling to breathe, every organ in her body a painful reminder of the choice she had made to smoke.

I wish every young girl faced with the decision to start smoking could have seen the tears of my children and felt their heartache as they said good-bye to their Nanna, even the youngest, at age 5, knowing that she would never see her grandmother again.

The fact that this particular piece of mail was sent to my mother would have almost made me laugh ... if I hadn't been crying. I picked up the phone and had her name removed from the Philip Morris mailing list.

It's not time to get glamorous - "It's Time to Get Real."

Smoking wrapped up in a bright pink envelope is still just what it is ... a killer!

By Jill Kunkel - Used with Permission

Before - After