Candy cigarettes have been around since the 1950's (when the epitome of cool was to roll a pack of smokes into a t-shirt sleeve), and while they are currently banned just about everywhere, they are still made and sold in some countries (according to Wikipedia, though there is no mention of exactly which ones). I actually found a site on the web which still sells them, and says they're for nostalgia or perhaps helping someone to quit by giving them a tasty alternative. I guess they haven't heard of vaping yet.
These days, the mere idea of it is preposterous: a very dangerous, unhealthy, unwholesome and nasty adult thing, made of candy and sold to children. If the notion hadn't already been done and (mostly) discarded and someone came up with the idea today, I imagine they would lose their job at the candy company and be escorted out of the factory by security.
I hadn't even thought of candy cigarettes in a long time, but a couple weeks ago I saw an e-juice review where the reviewer (I think it was Pbusardo) said the liquid tasted like the candy cigarettes from his youth. It produced a spasm of memories and thoughts about them.
The flavor he described was not like the candy cigarettes I remembered, which I assume was a regional distinction. Perhaps there were different brands and the place I went to for candy only carried the one, but when I was a kid in the 1970's, candy cigarettes were basically bubblegum wrapped in a thin tube of white paper. I have this very clear memory of another kid showing me how to make them produce 'smoke' by blowing air through one end, which would blow all the powdered sugar off the gum and make a little white cloud. At 11 years old, I thought this was a brilliant and impressive little trick until he explained that, in order for it to get anyone's attention, you had to make sure they were watching when you did it, because it only worked once.
In his mind, this trick had a singular purpose: to fool adults into thinking you were smoking a cigarette. He talked about his experiences with adults who came storming over to take away his cigarette and lecture him, and how he triumphed by making them look stupid when he showed them it was just a piece of bubblegum. I thought he was needlessly inviting hassle, and when I found out the trick only worked once becuase it used up all the powdered sugar, I became completely disinterested in candy cigarettes. I wanted it to last. Not to get attention or cause controversy, but because I liked how it looked.
Many years later I went on to develop a thirty year smoking habit that nearly killed me, and now I'm a happy vaper. But I wonder about that kid, the one who showed me how to incite adults with the tiny puff of sugar from the end of our candy cigarettes. I imagine he eventually grew up to be a smoker too, and hopefully he found vaping like I did. If he did, I bet he's now a rebellious, sub-ohming cloud-chaser, continuing his quest to challenge and outrage authority figures and make them look silly.
