Smoking sweet

Why is it that every boy tries to act like a man to look stronger, by mimicking some adult habits like pretending to hold a cigarette and puff up imaginary smoke by curling his lips and tilting his head upwards. I know because I've done that a lot, not because I wanted to feel like a man but because it felt so cool !! The heroes in movies and advertisements puff up smoke, then go and do awesome things like kicking villain's ass or impressing a girl with their macho. I tried to feel that awesomeness too, but using fake cigarettes.
Amongst my fake cigarettes, my favorite one was 'pencil'. Yes, I always had a pencil with me in my pencil-box, and of different sizes. It was always available. Sometimes I used to eat off some wood at the end of the pencil, sometimes the lead. And holding the pencil between my index and middle finger, and slowly, easily exhaling air pretending it to be loaded with nicotine made me feel all tension leaving my mind. Now I know it was the 'slow exhalation' step in 'deep breathing' exercise which is famously used in Yoga and relaxation techniques.
I also used Phantom 'sweet cigarettes' which I'm sure some of you who lived their childhood in the 1990s would know about. Now this was basically white peppermint with red color at one of its tip to show the burning part of cigarette. And if we split it in two equal halves, there was always an argument on who'd get the one with the red color at the tip.
And the most unusual one, which you may find awkward, the lolipop! At least on the outside, it looks a little like cigarette!
The best season to test out the fake cigarettes is Winters, especially early mornings. While going to school my friends and I used to compete as to how much fog a person could exhale. That macho feeling amidst the shivers... what fun !!