VINTAGE SMOKE

Ope, You pull on the front door to enter, but you're immediately met with the only other options doors give.. which closely resemble a wall with a knob. You look down at your watch. It's only 9..Are they closed already and I just missed it? You peer past the neon through the large glass pane of the dimly lit store. You can't help but notice it seems cloudy inside, or maybe you're just seeing things.. You scan the interior and soon spot the top of someones head.  White hair pulled back floating just behind a short wall of Vinyl records. Hellooo?...you knock a few times on the glass. The head quickly rises just high enough to see eyes searching for yours. The shop owner maybe...The head drops back down and casually passes through the aisle with a thin trail of smoke following him. Finally Rounding the corner to reveal an entire person with an entire cigar just departing the lower half of his head.. He walks up to the door, exhales a puff of smoke and says with a scratchy voice "I'm sorry, we're closed," His demeanor matching his pace. You convince him to let you in and push through the cloud to hunt down the vinyl you were after. While searching you see the owner organizing shelves and puffing away out of the corner of your eye and start to wonder, "seems odd he's smoking a cigar in here?." You eventually find it and head to the counter to pay. You throw him the "I'm good to go" gesture and he sets down a record to assist. You hand over your selection and thank him once again for opening the store. Then you ask, "your customers ok with all this smoke"?  He slides right into "oh yeah, they love it. They just don't know it." he ends with a slight chuckle. You respond with a look of confusion. Then he picks up the smoking cigar from the ashtray on the checkout counter and continues while holding it up in front of you.  This specific cigar is just as much a part of this store as I am...He takes a puff and blows it upward.  "The customers don't see it, but they sense it when shopping here."  " It's part of the character and personality of an experience each customer gets that can't be found anywhere... after a short pause he looks around and sets the cigar back down. " I've learned in my years, a unique experience is solidified as a memory when paired with a scent.... I want people to remember, how they felt when they were here. All the emotions and senses involved that paint a fuller picture. This isn't just a record store.. naw.. it's a moment in time you just may hold for the rest of your life... You just caught me keeping that character alive." He ended with a chuckle cough back to a chuckle. After leaving the store you ponder the white hair shop owner's story and recall, how you convinced him to let you in and what you got from the store. You fill in your own parts of the story.