“There is no secret of life. Life's aim, if it has one, is simply to be always looking for temptations. There are not nearly enough. I sometimes pass a whole day without coming across a single one. It is quite dreadful. It makes one so nervous about the future.”  -  Oscar Wilde

In only 18 days the world’s biggest pipe event begins: The Chicagoland International Pipe and Tobacciana Exposition. I still haven’t decided whether I will attend or not and, believe me, I’ve spent more than a little time thinking about it. While thinking about it has nearly driven me ‘round the bend, my cogitations have helped me clarify what the show has to offer and why I value it.

When it comes to buying or selling pipes and tobacco, the Chicago Show is without peer. Artisans, retailers, re-sellers, collectors, and casual enthusiasts all show up ready to look, lust, love, niggle, haggle, or hustle. It’s the 21st Century equivalent of some Byzantine bazaar where people traffic in the most exotic, nearly unattainable, and rare tobacciana objects. 

There are acres of pipes and opportunities to meet and talk with the people who have made them. Even the legends may be found there and, for the most part, they are an amiable, personable lot whose ready handshake and warm gaze is as available to the shy newbie as to the well-heeled collector. It is also a place where people of like mind and like passion feel less alone and less crazy.

Beset with long-suffering spouses, tax-insatiable governments, hectoring physicians, and priggish, censorious communities of people who claim that they know what’s best for us and aim to do something about it, the pipe-smoker’s world feels like it’s shrinking to Lilliputian dimensions.

However, none of that feels true for two or three glorious and relief-filled days on the grounds of Pheasant Run Resort where nearly every person one encounters - stranger or not - says hello and smiles, albeit with slightly yellowed teeth. Yes, for several days it’s okay to sit and puff - libation in hand - and talk into the wee hours about pipes and tobaccos.

I would swear that gravity’s force increases during that first weekend in May. It’s harder to move away from anything interesting. Self-discipline becomes a remembered virtue - something conceptual, not practical. It’s a time and place where it is too easy to spend a lot of money.

The unreality of it all, the fact that so many others are doling wads of cash out, and the sheer volume of beautiful and desirable pipes calling me to the rocks of insolvency like little briar sirens - I imagine I’d feel less tempted in a Bangkok brothel, not that I know. Monday and all the Mondays cascading from the calendar feel so far, far away on the first Saturday morning when the show doors open. Consequences? What consequences?

I am receiving much encouragement from my pipe-community friends to come to the show. They have a higher opinion of me than I do: “Just come and hang out, Neill. I know lots of guys who come and look and don’t spend a lot of money. You can do that. It won’t be the same without you.”

I wonder how my friends can understand so little about me. When it comes to pipes and vintage tobaccos, opportunity may knock only once, but temptation leans on the doorbell.

Mark Twain once remarked, “I deal with temptation by yielding to it.” That’s been my strategy and, to date, it’s worked well...until the credit card bill came in. Then the doors of Hell yawn open and the jeering, leering demons of conscience bray and keen for days on end. For years, on that Monday I have resolved “Never again. Never again. I am a grown-up. I can do this.”

George Orwell wrote, “No doubt alcohol, tobacco, and so forth, are things that a saint must avoid, but sainthood is also a thing that human beings must avoid... Many people genuinely do not wish to be saints, and it is probable that some who achieve or aspire to sainthood have never felt much temptation to be human beings.” George, let me tell you, old friend, I am a human being and no saint.

In these dark days of the great recession, necessity is succeeding where restraint failed. I am a new man, albeit not particularly improved. I think carefully about how I spend my money because, frankly, business is dicey these days. So far, so good, but business development cycles have lengthened, cash flow is sporadic, and my clients are as nervous as big-racked bucks on the first day of hunting season. It seems foolhardy for me to go to Chicago and drop a bundle on anything. Like many others, I feel the urge to conserve my resources because I just don’t know what’s going to happen next. 

The recession has also had some other effects on me. I have commenced a serious conversation with myself about the morality of obsessively acquiring luxury collectibles when so many people are struggling to feed and house themselves.

Earlier I wrote that my cogitating had helped surface what matters to me. When it occurred to me that the show is far more than the world’s largest pipe and tobacco shop, I see some glimmers of light. At the top of this post you see a picture I took at last year’s show of collector Rick Newcombe and artisan Paulo Becker. Rick’s affection for Paulo is evident and the show affords their friendship an opportunity to be renewed.

In many ways the Chicago show is more than a bazaar, it is a reunion - a gathering of people who share common ground, common interests, and common problems. It is a place where we can look at others and be reminded of who we are in the world.

We may choose pipes, but friends choose us. In these uncertain times, owning things may conjure some satisfaction, but a friend’s love is a wellspring of hope and affirmation - things that cannot be bought but must be given.

One thing I know for certain, I can find many wonderful friends at this year’s show, if I decide to go. I can find one of my communities - a precious one to be sure.

I just may go.