(Here's an elaborate explanation of a No Smoking Policy emailed to a
smoker applicant promising to not smoke in the house if we would let
him move in.  Oh what a touchy situation!  Is this too long, too much
information? Or useful?  If it helps you, that's what it's here for.
Anyway the email below actually worked, the applicant was accepted,
and did well as a housemate.)


  		   No Smoking Policy Explained

Hi, thanks for your application, and your friend just called me to
give you an unsolicited character reference, so that's good.  You seem
like a fine fellow to me so far.  I'm about to check your credit and
stuff but let me say first....

My issue is going to be the smoking so please here is my rant on the
subject, it's nothing personal but you should honestly think about it
and consult your inner truth before responding.

So.  1210 is a non-smoking house.  Well, but the usual thing that
happens around that is that someone says, Oh no I'll just smoke
outside.  And then some day it's snowing outside, or they happen to
have a bad day and the window is open anyway, or oh it's just vaping
that's not smoking, or hey I'm out in the shed and that's not the
house so it's okay.  And generally things just tend to drop off toward
not really worrying about it that much.  And Oh! I know people that
don't even actually see themselves dropping their own butts they are
actually physically incapable of seeing it, but then, yes, I sure have
to come after and clean it up.  This type of thing.  If you tell me,
it's no problem and you'll be good about not smoking in the house or
into windows or out of windows or in the shed and keeping all the
butts in the right place, the common sense of what no smoking means, I
can say Yes and I have done so before.

But on that occasion the result was me resenting the butts around the
doorways and the windows letting cold air in and then the girlfriend
eventually dumped him and guess who was the hated authority figure who
the smoker had to rage against: me.  It actually became rather ugly
and yes that person had a lot of other issues too but his attachment
to his smoking was definitely part of his hostility equation for
me. Sorry, it's not personal to you, but it happened to me
nonetheless.

And then if I look back to family members who would smoke, wow, the
same addiction-based mistreatment of others keeps on going. My Dad,
for example, smoking in the van while driving in the winter with the
windows closed.  Hey that's nice for the kids. Or my great aunt, who
died with yellow ceilings, oh, hey that's white after I wipe it with a
wet cloth; her face crushed a cigarette out when her aneurysm broke
and thank god it didn't burn down the house but what a way to die, she
was gone before her face hit the newspaper on the kitchen table --
that's how I want to die!  But really? Keeping all the neighbors
hypervigilant, so their houses didn't burn down too, in case they
weren't so lucky, so yes, they did have the cops in her kitchen before
the tea pot boiled dry at 7am the morning she died.  Nothing, it turns
out, is actually private.  So, Do you see?  That's the theme for
me. So.

At the same time, how can I say No if you commit to keeping the house
non-smoking and then actually do it and actually (is it even
possible?) not resent it.  There are housemates who are on the No
Smoking side of the fence, too, so you should really consider if you
will be comfortable in a place where everyone depends on each other in
the house and has to support each other or maybe internal governance
will have to make a change.  For example, I'll be doing quarterly
walk-throughs and having a good sniff and if this is where it has gone
then there will be an eviction for cause, and if that means I have to
evict the entire house after 5 years and 33 tenants then okay by me,
because I'm freaking serious, this is a No Smoking house (did I need
to include the shed in the back? of course yes also the shed in the
back).  So is that okay by you?

I have some sympathy for you too, I mean you haven't lied and come on
in just to break the rules without saying anything, that's a plus, and
also is it really okay for you to choose to live in and feel the
tender feelings of home toward a place that doesn't accept something
that is your port in the storm, your self-soothing solution to stress,
your own personal relationship with the smoking thing? I think it
might be the better part of wisdom for you to say No, I don't want to
receive that kind of judgemental squint eye on this or anything else,
but here your friend says you're not really a smoker.  Okay, so tell
me you won't be trouble neither soon nor eventually.  And then I'll do
your application.  And sorry to raise the temperature so much but I
just want to be clear, given that in my personal history I have not
always had the power to be clear and the result has sucked for me and
others. My attachment personally is to being clear. So, I was.  Now
your turn, talk to me.

Respectfully yours,

Tom Veatch