When icons die -- especially one after the other, e.g., Ed McMahon, Farah Fawcett, and the legendary Michael Jackson -- we, at least momentarily, tend to focus on our own mortality. Life in progress or finite follies as I sometimes call it, can include powerful addictive disorders. When celebrities croak, we may feel more vulnerable than usual and that's a moment of opportunity to address a long-entrenched nicotine enslavement and to take action.

I could never have halted my addiction to...