Blow the Smoke Away

Oh, the pain, the suffering. I know cigarettes are disgusting, this I know. Does that stop me from wanting one, hell no. And now I am quitting, again. Not because I want to but because I have to. A nasty surgery that I have finally decided to go ahead with makes this deprivation necessary. Damn it! Curses!

I smoked briefly in my early 20s when I was bartending in California. I loved those leisurely cigarette breaks back when you could smoke while working behind the bar. I would make myself a cup of weak coffee, switch to the Simpsons and enjoy one long, lovely drag after another.

Granted, it was pretty sick that my clothes reeked of cigarette smoke when I got home at night. But it wasn't much worse than my old job at the coffee store when i came home stinking of coffee.

Eventually, after I moved from slinging drinks to VFX, I quit smoking for good. I don't recall it being that hard of a transition because I was never a heavy smoker. Plus, many of my friends stopped smoking around the same time and this made it easier to abstain. Maybe it had something to do with all of us growing up or something?

Still, watching the programmers milling around outside smoking their 10th ciggie of the day and inhaling their 4th can of Jolt, a part of me got a wee bit wistful. I wanted some time outdoors to space out and relax. Fact was, without a cigarette in my hand, I would just look like I was jacking off! Oh, the unfairness of it all!

Still, I stayed a non-smoker for many years. They say your lungs will turn pink again after 7 years without smoking and I made it that long...until I fell off the wagon recently.

There is something about stress that makes smoking inevitable. When the world is falling apart around you, there are many crutches you can reach for: booze, pills, sex, hard drugs or, my personal favorite, nicotine.

What can I say? I needed a little bit of help. Something to look forward to in the morning. Something stronger than my usual cup of tea. Smoking again has been so much fun. I love to smoke in my car with the windows open. I love to smoke on long, luxurious drives and drink in the scenery as whisps of smoke drift out the window.

I love to share cigarettes with people, your fingers touching mid-hand off and bonding you in that special smoking moment. I love to stand outside with strangers who are all smoking, and feel somehow tied to them by our mutual act of sucking and blowing. I love to take little smoke breaks and dawdle around the neighborhood. I love to smoke at night and look at the stars. I love to smoke and chat with my far off friends on my cell phone.

I love the ritual of taking out a cigarette, all long and graceful, securing it in your mouth, lighting the flame to its tip and sucking in its dark cloud of death. I love the fact that every single cigarette shortens my time on this planet. When I smoke, it is like I am embracing death and saying "How dee do." Shit, I love to smoke.

Ah well, quit I must do and quit I will do. I've only been smoking for a couple of months but I can't help but be slightly embarrassed when people I know see me smoking. There is the inevitable sideways glance and then a bit of an under the breath "Tut, tut." Makes me feel like I got caught red handed flashing little kids or something. Christ, they're MY lungs to kill as I see fit, damn it!

Granted, I am old enough to know better. And there is something sort of sad about smoking old people I guess. But the deciding factor was the embarrassment of telling my surgeon that I had been smoking and the horrified look on his face as he listed the litany of problems smoking might cause after surgery. Damn it, time to give up the ghost.

Still, even once I am smoke-free and waiting another 7 years for my lungs to get clean, I will always, always, love cigarettes for the quiet personal time they give me to sort through my thoughts and stand around doing nothing.

A really smart person should figure out something comparable for non-smokers, like a "thought break" or a "cloud watching break." But it would probably never catch on, there is just no substitute for red glowing death on a stick...