The Art of the Cigar – Part 2

Don’t – however right you are convinced you might be – go around telling others how to enjoy their cigars.

So, you like a well-aged Romeo y Julieta Cazadores – bully for you. That doesn’t mean everyone else should like it too.

If your pal wants a Swisher Sweet to dip in his mug of tea at elevenses, more power to the lad. Just don’t bring him along to Sautter.

The point being that discussing the things you love and the sticks you’ve enjoyed is all part of the cigar brethren experience. It also means we should remember to leave room for other experiences and opinions – something which seems to be a dying art in society today.

Being belligerent about every last thing is a sign of insecurity. It’s also a sign of being a dick.

So, if you see someone lighting up their chosen stick with a petrol lighter, don’t throw your hands up in horror and make an exhibition of the poor chap (or lady, for that matter). No, a petrol flame isn’t really the done thing, but it’s hardly the same as garrotting your firstborn. Live and let live, we say. Far too many people spend their days trying to tell us how to live our lives as it is.

What is much more fun than telling everyone how much you know about cigars is actually shutting up and listening to someone who really does know a bit. You’ll tend to find that these people are the quieter ones anyway, the ones who will be drowned out if there’s a loudmouth about.

So observe, listen and politely enquire and you’ll find your cigar knowledge will go through the roof.

As will your friendly neighbourhood cigar merchant if you bugger things about in his humidor. By all means have a good old look around – it’s amazing what old or forgotten about stock you can find tucked behind boxes on humidor shelves. Just don’t go mad. Your merchant will have put a lot of time and thought into his humidor; how to stock it, how he works his stock rotation, whether New World or Cuban should go here etc. And he’ll be trying to minimise his damages too; you can’t sell a cigar with a dirty crack running up the wrapper.

Don’t go at it like a bull elephant is what we’re saying; don’t leave a trail of devastation and fractured wrapper in your wake. Put things back as you found them, treat the cigars with some respect. And if, purely by accident, you do damage a cigar or even a box, don’t bury it under something else and wander out, whistling “This Old Man” innocently; tell your tobacconist. He’ll value your honesty, and remember it.

Cigar smoking is about the finer things in life and we should strive to keep it that way. Let the oiks out there shout each other down and misbehave. You’ll enjoy your smoke all the more when your little moment of peace is shared agreeably with your fellow man.