TJ's last day:
As you read this, our intrepid host is drumming his fingers on a pleather chair, waiting for his flight to be called, wondering just when it was exactly that airports stopped letting you smoke inside them, but grateful they did because it removes the choice to smoke for him for the next ten to twelve hours of this day, his first day of not smoking, and his thirty-fifth birthday. Bend your thoughts to this gum-chewing traveler and wish him a safe trip, a good birthday, and as smooth a transition over the next weeks as quitting smoking can bring.
Or, you know, you could leave a comment, if you're not the thought-bending type.
In honor of Jeff's decision, I'll share a quitting smoking story. Let it be a cautionary tale that tells the quitter you're never safe from the Snare of Nic O'Teen.
I smoked from the age of 15 to the age of 30. Half my life with half a dozen quit attempts in there. The most successful and most shameful attempt came in the spring of my (first) senior year. My grandparents knew everyone in my family smoked and having quit themselves ten or fifteen years before, wanted us to quit, too. They offered $500 to anyone in the family who would quit for three months.
I took the offer. I had nothing to lose. I didn't have to pay them $500 if I smoked. But there I was at college--how would they know if I really had. This was going to be my big moment of honor. I really did quit. Cold turkey. I told all my friends and they helped me not slip up, although, the promise of the $500, and more importantly, a definable goal, a time limit of three months made it oddly easy not to smoke. I think on like the night of day 3 or 4, I got pretty drunk in a bar and never once reached for a cigarette. I thought the next morning if I could make it through that, the next three months would fly by.
The months flew by. I was running again, mitigating the inevitable weight gain. At three months, my grandparents came up to school and took my girlfriend and me out to dinner. They presented me with a check and made a big speech about how proud they were that I'd done it. They believed that I'd been honest about it over the three months and I had. I thanked them for helping me, for making it so easy to quit. I told them how glad I was I had quit smoking and it was true.
Two weeks after the cashing of the $500 check and I still hadn't smoked. I had quit. But my girlfriend at the time had never stopped smoking. She was one of those social puffers, not a believer like so many of us are, but not just a "only when I drink" type, either. This hadn't bothered me over the three months, hadn't been a problem.
One warm spring Iowa evening after a big meal, more than three months since a cigarette had come anywhere near me, I was walking her back over to her dorm when I asked her for a cigarette. "These are the times," I said, "that I miss it most. When I'm at my most comfortable and content. The perfect cap. It's like a way to recognize the moment."
She didn't give a shit, not much for the poetic or the philosophical. She handed me a Marlboro Light and her lighter. "Are you sure about this?" she asked, after putting it in my hand. A weak attempt at finding absolution, I suppose now.
"Yep." I was so cocky. "I've quit. It's been three months." And then I repeated the lie that Nic O'Teen whispers in your ear so quietly that you believe you thought it up yourself: "I can have one." And that one? I didn't really even enjoy it. It tasted cloudy, like stuffing my mouth with dirty cotton. Nothing of the old pleasures were in it except the familiarity of the motions. But the one I had three days later was a little better, and the five I had at the bar a couple days after that were great. Habitual. Permitted.
Two weeks after that, I bought my first pack of Marlboro Reds in four months, deeply disappointing myself, my grandparents, and the rest of my family who now thought I'd lied about the season I'd quit, as well, just for the money.
It was another eight years--and how many years off my life--before I'd seriously try to quit again.
The moral is clear and serious: You're never safe. You're always a smoker who doesn't smoke. My grandmother told me once that if she found out she had 6 months to live the first thing she'd do is buy a pack of cigarettes. She hasn't smoked since Reagan's first term. The desire never goes away. The trick is to always say no and let those no's pile up so that any future yes is a thumb in the eye of all the previous no's.
You know, some clown can give you all the advice in the world. You can read brochures, look at pictures of black lungs, men holding microphones to holes in their throats, join support groups like Quitnet. But those are all rationalizations and it's just as easy to rationalize smoking.
I'm not a very Zen person, but I believe this little koan: To not smoke you have to not smoke. Every time.
This is exactly what happened to my husband and our neighbors. A cautionary tale to all those who would bribe smokers to quit.
Hubby told them if they would quit smoking for one year, he would take us all to dinner to whatever restaurant they chose. They chose Milles Fleurs in Rancho Santa Fe.
They quit cold turkey for a whole year. We took them to Milles Fleurs, rang up a HUGE tab and toasted to their nicotine sobriety. The next morning the husband lit up, just to try it out. The wife didn't smoke for a couple of weeks, or at least, that's what she told us. Pretty soon they were both puffing regularly again.
Posted by: Bonnie | November 17, 2005 at 10:21 AM
A perfect way to recognize the moment How true. Well said - I hadn't thought about it in exactly those terms. And that's what makes it so hard, because there are always "moments" to recognize. Whether it's a changing of seasons, or a great day, or a shitty day, or reuniting with old friends, the temptation is always there.
Do you see the way we talk about this drug? I seriously can't believe that nicotine is legal, and other things are not. This is not an argument to legalize drugs, but how can something so completely addictive and destructive as nicotine be legal? Of course I know the answer to this, but it's amazing nonetheless.
Posted by: agent disco | November 17, 2005 at 10:59 AM
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