Oh, baby, my hair's on end about you

Ever awake to the fact that a good chunk of the people in your life are no longer in your life in any tangible way? Hey, it happens. That's what Thanksgiving is for, though: to acknowledge how fucking alone you now are. Wait, maybe I've got that wrong...

Let's move on. Today dragged. I got out of work at three, but it felt like I was there forever. I did go in an hour earlier, but still, it wasn't like it was a long day. Chalk it up to the anticipation of four days off.

I went to work an hour earlier yesterday and was tired all day. Wanting to avoid another day like that, I went to sleep around eleven thirty last night. Early for me -- I usually hit the hay around one thirty -- but late for most working folk. I got eight hours of sleep and still felt tired all day. I think, even if I got twelve hours of sleep, I would have been sleepy today. And why is that? Well, my theory is that it's not how much sleep I get, but when I wake up that determines my level of energy. Sure, I'll allow there are other factors involved, but I think I'm on to something. If I went to bed at six in the morning and woke up at ten, I bet I would have had more energy. Don't think so? Maybe you're right. I never said it was a well thought out theory.
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During my run last night, I caught a whiff of cigarette smoke. I couldn't see anyone, but I knew I'd encounter the culprit up ahead. I continued to run, suffering through the pungent aroma, and, sure enough, there was a woman about ten yards in front of me smoking a butt. I held my breath as I ran by her.

The incident brought forth the realization that this month marks my four year anniversary of quitting smoking. I don't remember the exact date, but I know it was early in the month. A momentous occasion? Sure, I guess. I'm happy I'm not smoking anymore, and it's great that it's been four years, but, frankly, I'm glad I almost forgot it's been four years. It indicates that smoking cigarettes is truly a thing of the past. So much so, that it's strange to think I ever smoked.

Almost everyone I know who used to smoke, no longer does. Spira quit a month or two before me, Luke warm a month or two after. Who else? Foley, Heath, my mom, Mike (he's in the early stages, but I'm adding him because I think he'll stick with it), Shane. There are more, but that's a good list: seven people. And these were full time smokers.

My mother quit years ago. I used to listen to her coughing all the time and worried she wouldn't be around much longer. It took catching pneumonia to get her to quit. It was the only time in her tenure as a smoker when she absolutely could not smoke (One of the insidious ways smoking takes a hold of you is when you smoke while ill. I had bronchitis in conjunction with a nasty case of strep throat one year and, though I couldn't smoke as much as I usually did, I still lit up). I never thought she'd quit, but she did. She looks better now, over a decade later, than she did when she smoked.

And then there's Heath. There's a guy I never -- let me capitalize that-- NEVER thought would quit smoking. He smoked up to three packs a day and probably would have smoked more if he didn't have to pause to eat, speak, and sleep. He was so associated with cigarettes, that one year Tracy replaced candles with lit cigarettes on his birthday cake. It was a funny sight, especially seeing salivate more over the "candles" than the cake. Another time, a few of us went to the City Room for breakfast, and there was Heath, and his then girlfriend, Marissa, sitting at a table outside, an ash tray overloaded with butts between them. I don't even think it was ten o'clock at that point.

I never thought Heath would live long past thirty, especially when I'd hear him cough. But, he quit smoking. And he stuck with it. Unbelievable! Now, when I talk to him, he tells me about his running routine, his martial arts training, and other healthy pursuits. He looks great. If anyone ever needed convincing that quitting smoking is not impossible, all they to do is look at Heath.

My first cigarette was between eighth and ninth grade. It was up in Maine, at my grandparent's summer place. My friends Steve, and his little brother, Mike, were frequently bored and smoking seemed like the perfect elixir. We enlisted the aid of Jaimie, the older kid a few houses up the road, to initiate us into the ways of smoking.

He started us on Marlboro reds. I'll never forget the dizziness and the foul taste. You have to really want to smoke, I believe. It doesn't possess you right away like they say heroin does. It took a while for me to enjoy the act of smoking.

It wasn't until I was a junior in high school, fuck, maybe it was earlier, that I became a full time smoker. I smoked at least a pack a day, never much more than that, and didn't even think about quitting until my twenties.

I never thought I'd be a career smoker. I'd hear people say they'd been smoking for fifteen or twenty years, and I'd think to myself, "How can anyone smoke that long?". To me, that was the territory of the hard core smokers. I couldn't see myself reaching that level. I always envisioned a smoke free, healthy life for myself somewhere down the line. One day, it hit me: I'd been smoking for over a decade. I'd graduated to the elite level of smoking.

My first real attempt at quitting (I'd made a few weak passes beforehand that don't bear mentioning) lasted about a year. I started up again during a camping trip in Vermont. If my memory serves, it was my first smoke-free camping trip. Sitting lazily around the fire next to people smoking was too much. I asked Spira for a drag of her cigarette. It wasn't long after that I asked for a cigarette all to myself. Don't worry, I told myself, and everyone who saw me with a cigarette, I'm just proving to myself that I don't like cigarettes anymore, that I now find them gross because it's been a year since I've had one and yada, yada, yada.

Well, I hated the gross taste of cigarettes so much that upon my return home from the camping trip I bought a pack of them. And then another, and another, and another. Maybe it wasn't such a good idea to put into practice how much of a non smoker I'd become by smoking cigarettes. Ah, how we rationalize.

Another attempt at quitting didn't last long. I had the bright idea to stop smoking regular cigarettes and replace them with clove cigarettes. The reasoning for it was that I'd smoke less of the clove cigarettes because they're unfiltered and last longer and eventually I'd wean myself off of them. Didn't work. I ended up smoking nearly as much of the cloves as I did the regular cigarettes. All I remember from that period is the sweet smell of cloves and constantly coughing and feeling sluggish. I don't recommend this method of quitting.

My friend Rachel quit smoking by weaning herself off cigarettes. Every day, she'd smoke a little less until eventually she didn't smoke at all. I tried that method. A couple of times. Never worked. What would happen is this: I'd go most of the day having smoked only a few cigarettes, but when I'd get home from work or school, I'd light up like it was going out of style. No matter what, I'd always end up smoking a pack.

My addiction to cigarettes, like with most chronic smokers, was all-encompassing. I'd smoke anywhere to feed the habit. If it was twenty below zero outside I'd be out there smoking if I couldn't inside. When I was living at my parent's house for a while after leaving Nashua, I'd smoke in my bedroom, despite telling my mother I wouldn't. I'd stick my head out of the window as far as I could, even when it was raining or snowing, and blow the smoke as far away as I could. She could always tell I was smoking, though. And not just from looking at her yellow-stained curtains. It broke my heart that I was so weak that I couldn't abide by my mother's wishes, but I continued smoking in the bedroom.

It was around that time when I really gave my habit some serious thought. Even though every smoker knows all the reasons not to smoke -- it's why I used to hate it when people would educate me about the dangers of smoking -- it wasn't until I took a stark look at how it was affecting my life that I took measures to quit.

One realization that stuck with me was that no matter how I rationalized it, I was a slave to my addiction. I asked myself, "How do you feel about about not only being a prisoner to something, but paying money to be one?" And the fucked up thing about being a prisoner, being shackled to my addiction, was that the key to loosen the shackles was in my hand the entire time. All I had to do was insert the key, twist, and I'd be free. I make excuse after excuse as to why, despite that truth, I couldn't quit. But, still, no matter what, the truth was the truth.

And it finally set in.

I knew right away that there was no turning back, that I was going to quit. It felt right. No excuses, no "Once I finish this pack, I'm going to quit", no "When the next full moon hits, that's when I'll quit."

A day or two into quitting, my car broke down on Rte 16 in Cambridge in rush hour traffic. My car was towed to a gas station and I sat inside the small shop waiting for a ride. I looked behind the counter at all the packs of cigarettes stacked on the shelves. I smiled to myself and thought, "This is when I should succumb to the stress of the situation and buy a pack, but I won't because I'm not feeling the urge".

And I didn't buy a pack. Haven't since. Early on, my mantra was that I was a non smoker. I didn't look at myself as someone who used to smoke but is now in recovery. I didn't look to former smokers for inspiration; for that I looked to people who never smoked. If I viewed myself as someone overcoming an addiction, I'd always have that hanging over my head like an albatross. Someone overcoming an addiction may be prone to relapsing. A non smoker has nothing to relapse to.

Spira, bless her, has smoked cigarettes since quitting. She's been able to do it here and there and not stumble back into a habit. I made sure never to have another cigarette, not ever; not because I'd be afraid that I'd start back up again if I did, but because, and here's the distinction, a non smoker doesn't smoke. Period.

There's been no looking back for me. It's why I almost missed my anniversary. I used to smoke, but that was a different me. In order for me to quit, I had to become a non smoker and not someone who's overcoming an addiction. It's worked for me; I never, ever think about smoking. In fact, it grosses me out to be around cigarettes. It offends my senses when I'm around someone smoking, especially when I'm exercising.

Every smoker knows they're in the grips of a bad habit, one that will most likely kill them, and painfully, some day. And every smoker knows they're a slave to their master, Lord Cigarette. They know this on paper, and by that I mean to say they know it from a logical perspective, but the knowledge hasn't reached their gut. When it does, they will quit. Simple as that.

I could regale you with all sorts of smoking stories -- they are legion -- and everyone of them makes me look weak willed and ridiculous. That's fine with me: I don't want to have any fond memories of smoking. That is not to say that while I smoked, I didn't enjoy myself. In hindsight, I can say that my enjoyment was just a manifestation of my sinister addiction, but at the time, well, I didn't know any better. I was a smoker, to be sure. A full timer. But now I'm not. And most of the people I know who smoked no longer do. That is something to be thankful about.

And on that note, happy Thanksgiving, dear readers.