Big Daddy smoked from time to time.  In fact, I remember he carried a pipe around, sometimes bowl up in his breast pocket, sometimes gripped between his teeth and sometimes in his hand while gesturing and pointing  in conversation.  But, now that I think about it, I don't really remember even the smell of tobacco associated with the pipe, so I guess my pipe-observations neither confirm, nor deny that he was a smoker.

Thinking about his pipe does bring to mind,  despite all my Grandmother's attempts to “hide it from the kids, coo coo ca choo,” memories that Big Daddy did occasionally like to fire up a big Churchhill.  I've actually seen that with my own eyes more than a few times.

??When?? Where?? (You might ask these things--and don't think I missed hearing the tone of doubt in your voice, Middle). 

Well, it was during the many times when I stood with Dad, Uncle Charles and Big Daddy in the backyard communing with them over that manliest of pass times (trying not to hack and cough from the low hanging smoke lingering below the tree branches and Spanish Moss in the still evening air). 

In fact, I remember fondly that it was in that backyard that I first learned how to nip off the end without getting it wet, how to scratch the match without snapping it in two, how to hold the cigar between my thumb and index finger (not between my index and middle fingers as you might hold a more delicate cigarette) and how to enjoy the smoke (see above) as it wafted around my head.  

It was in that backyard that I heard the stories about the Farm, the Great War, the Flood, the Depression, where everyone was when Pearl Harbor was attacked and where they were when that War was over, hitchhiking to Ole Miss and more.  Yeah, laughing and joking and chewing and smoking, they shared freely man-to-man, during those Cro-magnon gatherings, and even though I was too young to do any more than nip, strike, and bathe in the smoke, I was included as an exile to the outdoors (Grandmother would have not endured the curling ribbons of blue smoke and the inevitable smoke rings in the house no matter how many Cuban seeds were involved). I WAS afterall, the eldest grandchild.  Those were the days.

Even so, at some point, the manly backyard gatherings ceased, partly because the "womenfolk" as they were called in those days, objected (it wasn't because they felt left out--they had heard all the stories already--it was because the smoking circle was "just too smelly"), and partly because of the fact that Dad and Uncle Charles eventually abandoned smoking altogether (and in case you were wondering, except for the one time when I was offered a puff--which involved a hot-boxed cigar, a little dry heaving and just a little jocularity--I never started). 

About the same time the back yard gatherings stopped, Grandmother and Big Daddy must have entered into a “don’t ask, don’t tell” kind of smoking-truce by which he pretended not to smoke and she pretended not to notice when he did.  In fact, I specifically remember a notable example of that truce being played out from a time when we were visiting them at “home” on Robinhood Road in Jackson.  

The truth and nothing but the truth (oh yes it is too) goes like this. 
 

Picture if you will, a corner-house nestled in and amongst tall maples, pines and oaks, perfectly suited for a grand-parental couple of advanced years, and filled to capacity by their two daughters, Dars Ann (technically, "Doris," but in Jackson, phonetically it’s "Dars") and Sudie Lee, along with their respective spouses (Robit and Chaswlss, a/k/a Dad and Uncle Charles) and a total of seven grand kids all younger than the age of ten.  Of course, under those crowded and potentially unruly conditions there are many legitimate reasons for the adults to want to escape from the confines of the house, so no one ever thought anything of it when every day after dinna (aka, lunch), and at about the same time as the aforementioned back yard gatherings had been taking place before they stopped, Big Daddy would announce that he was off to survey the neighborhood (he was in fact, known as the “mayor” of Robinhood Road). 

Anyone who wanted to go was invited to join him on his walk, but “some” (i.e. Grandmother) would stay home to “wash the dishes” instead.  That's because notwithstanding all its other virtues, walking around the block gave Big Daddy a solid and uninterrupted twenty minutes to . . .  well, you guessed it . . . to  enjoy an aromatic and satisfying, if not just a little stimulating and ever-familiar torpedo-shaped bundle of burning tobacco leaves, even without manly company and stories (I'm told the nicotine from the tobacco itself is physically stimulating, but from the twinkle in his eye, I'm confident that most of the rush he experienced from "surveying the neighborhood" was derived from the "danger" associated with doing something Grandmother didn't want him to do). 

There is an interesting picture of the dynamics that characterized their relationship that is shown in the fact that  by "chance," dish-washing while Big Daddy walked gave Grandmother the perfect venue from which to surreptitiously observe him as he passed by the kitchen window (she always said she "liked the way he looked" btw, so it wasn't all spying).  As a result, undoubtedly aware of Grandmother's watchful eye and as an homage to her sensibilities, he would cup the cigar in his hands behind his back as he passed by the window, looking up towards the tops of the perfectly spaced maple trees he had planted years before as if inspecting them for insects or dry rot or whatever.  (Imagine him whistling nonchalantly here too).  Grandmother would point at him through the curtains laughing under her breath saying, "Look at Big Daddy.  He's out there with a cigar, and he thinks I don’t know it ‘cause he's hidin’ the smelly thing behind his back.  He’s just like a little boy who sneaks a cigarette out behind the barn!  (I do like the way he looks though)."  She’d laugh a little more, and roll her eyes (AHA! that's where you and Youngest learned that trick).  She huffed a little and even pretend to be what we called “put out” with him, but she never, ever said anything to him about it.  She didn't ask, he didn't tell.  He puffed. She knew. And they both pretended they didn't, even though they did.  
 

So practiced did he become at this ruse,  when Grandmother inevitably remarked with a heavy sigh, “there goes Big Daddy, smoking that foul thing again,” we never saw a smidgen of evidence supporting her claim.  It was the perfect charade.  That is, it was until one day when I didn't walk with him because I hadn't finished raking leaves.  I came inside for a drink and when I heard her remark, I remember I was  curious about the basis of her intuition (and, I guess I might have been looking for insight as to how I might avoid discovery if I ever had a chance to enjoy a stogie myself, not withstanding the hot-boxing incident). I knitted my brow seriously and asked, “why DO you even think he's  smoking?”   

You might suspect that she’d duck and cover, guard her sources or just say “I just know!” only to chuckle later when the womenfolk (you remember, that's what they were called then) huddled to tell their stories.  Or, you might think that she'd  confess that she deduced it from the peppermint and Brylcreem smell that was a vain attempt to mask the cigar aroma that followed Big Daddy when he returned.  But no. She didn't do any of those things. 

Rather, she candidly revealed that there was much stronger proof thanany  intuition or speculation:  

"He doesn't know it, but when he tries to hide his cigar,
it burns little holes in the back of his trousers!!"

She made that revelation so that everyone in the house heard it, and they all laughed out loud.  It certainly confirmed why Grandmother didn't have to ask and Big Daddy didn't have to tell.  She just  knew.

Of course, no one ever mentioned it, and whenever he asked "where are my gray pants," Grandmother would just say, "at the cleaners" and hand him a new pair.   

And even though he always enjoyed the aroma of a good cigar, eventually, Big Daddy followed the rest of the pack in resigning from smoking altogether, and all us menfolk took to creating bonding moments by reading the funny papers together on the screened in porch, taking our  Co-colas of an evenin' from the closet there.