Introduction

I am in a hotel room in Montréal in January. I’ve come for a conference and also a reprieve from the demands of middle-class life – a promise of sleeping through the night without waking children, a big hotel bed, and breakfast made for me in the morning. Like most good academics I am equipped with my conference vices. I’ve picked up a bottle of Scotch from the liquor store and an illicit pack of cigarettes from the dépanneur. All I want after a long day of work and travel is to retreat to my hotel room for a nip and a smoke before looking over my paper one more time in preparation for the morning. I’m staying at an older hotel just off Ste. Catherine, bougie and boutique. Surprisingly, the windows open. This, to me, is an invitation to do exactly as I hoped I could – sneak a smoke without having to brave the minus thirty-degree weather. An admitted conference smoker, I am no stranger to work-arounds when it comes to hotel no-smoking policies. So, without much thought, I pour myself a drink, stuff a towel under the hotel room door and throw open the window. I perch myself on the sill, feel the Scotch burn and light up a cigarette. Because I smoke so rarely, I feel buzzed half way through, put it out, leave the window open a crack and move to the desk to get to work.