nic fit

I started smoking when I was working at Smiley-Mart. I started quite intentionally - nothing accidental about it. I'd had an incredibly shitty, stressful day at The Chair Comapny and then I'd gone on to work 5 hours at Smiley Mart (which might not sound like much, but go work 5 hours standing up after an 8 hour day and come talk to me. It's not coal-mining, but it still sucks) and I'd had customers yell at me for no reason and things go wrong and it was just a generally shitty day. Thirteen hours of suck.

As I was driving home, I thought to myself "I want a cigarette," quite clearly and plainly. Not "I want a beer" or "I want a glass of wine" - my usual de-stressors. But, "I want a cigarette." I thought of pulling it out of the pack and putting it between my lips and how you have to inhale just a little when you light it. I thought of how I'm such a lightweight that it would hit me right between the eyes around my third drag. I thought of that weird papery taste that lights and ultra-lights have. I thought about getting a Diet Coke or a candy bar or some gum or just waiting until I got home and having a glass of wine and I realized that no, even though the only time I ever smoked is when I was drinking (and even then only after I'd had a few) I wanted a damn cigarette and I wanted it right now.

So I pulled into a Seven-Eleven and I got a pack of Marlboro Lights.

I was right, the third drag hit me right between the eyes and made me just a little dizzy. I smoked that whole thing down to the filters and my God it was good. I smoked it with the windows rolled down and metal blasting from my CD player while I screamed up Mopac at 75 miles an hour. It was very, very good.

That was April and since then I've gone down to Ultra-Lights. I've smoked between a half-pack and a pack a day for the past four months. It depends on what I'm doing, how busy I am, how annoyed I am with the world in general, that sort of thing.

Every pack I buy is my last. I know I'll quit, at some point. Jef wants to quit, and I'll help him. Even now, even with this itch behind my eyes and this little man running around in my head, jabbering "got a light? got a light? gotalightgotalightgotalightgotalightgotalightgotalightgotalightgotalightgotalight????????????" because I left my cigarettes at home in an effort to cut down during the day, I know that I'll quit at some point, because that's what you do. I still firmly believe that the only things a person can't quit doing are eating, breathing and shitting.

The problem is, with the exception of the smell on my hands and the cost (dear lord, are these things made out of panda pancreas???) I like smoking. I've never really had a problem with smokers. Smoke bothers my eyes, but I can deal with it. Once I'm out of the smoke, I can't stand the way I smell, but I can handle being in a smokey room or house just fine. I've always viewed smoking in bars as part and parcel of being in bars.

Just like every other smoker out there, I like the ritual. Packing the cigarettes, stripping my pack the way I like it. I flip a lucky, because I'm a superstitious ninny and I hang out with teenagers. I like to leave the plastic on the bottom because sometimes I end up sticking stuff in there - money, matches, notes. My lucky is the middle front cigarette; I flip it upside down and put it back in the pack, then pull out the one right next to it. The lucky gets smoked last; everybody knows that.

I don't like soft packs. I'm too disorganized for something that doesn't close back up and might come open and spill all my cigarettes into my purse.

I like sitting with my boyfriend, at his desk, at my table, at a table in a pub and splitting a pack of cigarettes and talking while we drink beer. I like how he has his rituals and I have mine. I like how he spent half an hour showing me how to flick ash because I kept missing the ashtray the way I was doing it. I like how when I showed up with my own pack at his house the first time and they were Lights, he told me "no, you smoke these if you're gonna smoke" and gave me his Ultra-Lights. Chivalry isn't dead, it's just slowly getting cancer in the corner. I like how he offers me one and sometimes I say yes and sometimes I say no, because sometimes I don't want a cigarette, just like sometimes I don't want ice cream. (But I always want beer.)

I like to smoke while I'm driving. I used to gnaw my nails down to the quick - now I smoke. I light up, flick the ash out the window, listen to my music entirely too loud. I twist the filter when I'm done and push the rest of the tobacco out onto the ground. The filter goes into the trash bag in my car. I use a lot of Febreeze.

I like the look of my hand when I have a cigarette between my fingers and I pick up a drink. I've never thought smoking made a person look cool, or uncool, or like anything but somebody who smoked. Some people reek of smoke, some people don't. The facts are, I'm a fidgeter with an oral fixation and an addictive personality. Smoking is tailor made for somebody like me.

I refuse to buy them by the carton, because that would be admitting that I actually smoke and that this is not some temporary thing I've picked up. Some days I take smoke breaks at work, some days I don't. Today I didn't even bring my cigarettes with me and it's driving me crazy.

So yeah, for now, I'm a smoker. I'll let y'all know when that changes.