In a weekly series, called Scenes from South Jersey, the South Jersey Times photographers are showcasing images that they see throughout their travels around the area; these images might be a moment at a news assignment or just something that catches the eye of the photographer going from assignment to assignment. Here is what caught our eye the weeks of Oct. 4- Oct. 17.
Dad died of a heart attack in 1969. Doctors were vague about what caused his death until they learned he was a heavy smoker who smoked 2-to-3 packs of unfiltered Lucky Strikes down to the nub every day. That ended the guessing game.
By then, I'd developed my own sick smoking habit. A varsity basketball player in high school, a quasi athlete, I never considered smoking until 1959 when I stayed up 24 hours to cram for an economics final at Gettysburg College, which, by the way, I failed miserably.
So I smoked an average of four packs of Marlboros a day from 1959 to 1976, a wretched 17-year stretch during which time my fingers yellowed and I developed a severe cough that woke me up every morning. By the way, to this day I blame sultry Julie London for the Marlboro habit ("Where there's a man, there's a Marlboro...") Every time she sang the song on TV, I ran out and purchased another 25-cent pack.
I once wrote a column about smoking and calculated that in the 17 years I'd smoked just under 500,000 cigarettes, or plenty to kill me.
I have a photograph of me standing in the Times newsroom around the time my dad passed away, a cigarette dangling from the corner of my mouth and butts strewn about in three or four nearby smelly ashtrays. To make matters worse, I also enjoyed a libation at the time, and the combination of booze and cigarettes gave me excruciating headaches, particularly in the wake-up hours.
Then, one morning, I woke up nursing the worst headache I could remember. I took several pain killer pills and made a vow I'd made before: I was giving up smoking at midnight, Dec. 31, at the Wenonah firehouse's annual New Year's Eve bash. Fittingly, the date also marked the start of the Bicentennial.
I marched into the firehouse from a house party around midnight, removed one last Marlboro from the pack, and announced to anyone who cared I was quitting.
I was met by catcalls from hordes of disbelievers, but was committed, and since then have held steadfastly to my pledge. Except for one smoke in 1980, after a family crisis, I've not smoked since.
That doesn't mean there hasn't been one frightening reminder.
In 1993, I had the first of three heart attacks and three days later found myself undergoing triple bypass surgery at Hahnemann Hospital in Philadelphia.
Surgery went fine. But after a seven-day hospital stay, routine for bypass surgery at the time, I underwent a series of examinations I had to pass in order to be discharged.
Seven days became 11, an eternity, before a physician entered my room.
"I have good news and bad news, Mr. Shryock," the doctor said. "The good news is that we'll discharge you this afternoon. "The bad news is, you may have quit smoking 17 years ago, but we've found residual smoke in your lungs.
"Have a nice day."
I coughed and went home.
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