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Darryl Jackson
Lock Haven
Chain-smoke -- verb -- to smoke continually, with little or no interruption
Weis Markets in Lock Haven is one of the most popular establishments in the city to have a smoke. The who's who of cigarette smokers are found no farther than arms-length from Weis Markets entrance. There is so much smoking going on in front of the building that there is a ceasefire placed no more than a shopping cart length away from the door. It's a common sight to see the hunched-over victims of Marlboro sucking in as many thousands of chemicals as they possibly can before, unwillingly, putting the cig out in the ceasefire.
Weis Markets work culture is enmeshed with cigarette culture. Every so often, on break, you can see the signature red polo shirt of a Weis Markets employee going out to have a smoke on their break. The grocery store patrons see the Weis Markets employees smoking and feel empowered to do the same. No need to mind the children's playground across the street, or the young families crawling out from under the haze as they exit Weis Markets.
Painfully ironic is the sign posted on the door (spitting distance from the cigarette ceasefire tower). The sign reads as follows: "Secondhand smoke kills over 38,000 Americans each year." I even pointed out this absurdity to the store manager, requesting that the employees at the very least take their smoke breaks elsewhere, to no response in writing or action.
Lock Haven has genuinely hard-working, kind-hearted employees, and they may not even realize that each time they have their smoke break, the children across Bald Eagle street are breathing deeply of their corporate cancer. The children at the Tiger Den playground in Lock Haven deserve better. The employees who are required to work on or around the Weis Markets entrance deserve better. Just remember on your way into Weis Markets, coughing through the haze, that "38,000 people die from secondhand smoke each year."