Fucked Up Love
This was meant to be a love letter to cigarettes and it may go there to some degree but seems to be heading in a different direction.
I love you cigarettes. Let’s start there. I have always loved you. I say love, yet perhaps “drawn to” is more accurate. I wish you weren’t bad for me. I do a lot of really “good” things for my health. I am an avid exerciser, I am focused (perhaps to a fault) on my nutrition. I meditate and am diligent about my mental and emotional health. It really makes zero sense that I would be so disciplined when it comes to most of my health, yet I smoke you?! I know. I agree. Mysteries abound.
I have at times over the years found myself turning to you in times of darkness and despair or simply in especially stressful times. I made an agreement with myself some time ago that you would be a happy habit. Something I did when I was having fun and I would enjoy you as opposed to drowning my sorrows or shoving my feelings underneath your spell. EEEEEEk here we go down that different path…
Fact: One cannot cry and smoke you at the same time. Just an impossibility. It is a breathing thing. Since you don’t smoke because you ARE smoke, this might not seem obvious but take my word for it. One also cannot run and cry. I know, running is better than you for me, but harder…
Back to my loving or simply being drawn to something that is not “good” for me. You, for one.
Who hasn’t loved or been drawn to something that wasn’t good for them? That was rhetorical. If you choose to answer and say “not me”, then we can’t be friends, either because you are lying, or you are in denial. Some of us can dig around and recall a time or two when this was the case, and then there is me. I live here. Or so it seems. I have moved away and inevitably, have moved home. What is the expression? You can’t go home”? I can and do, on the regular.
I would like to add that I am vaping my way through this. That’s a whole different story which I will get to.
Sorry. I guess I’m cheating? Hmmmmmmm.
At least I am not ashing your burned remnants on my computer keyboard. Silver linings. I like those.
A bit of irony: When I love or am drawn to things (boys) who are not good for me, I tend to also be drawn to things (you) that are not good for me. Goes hand in hand, or mouth as the case may be. In for a penny, in for a pound.
The ultimate is when I am drawn to a smoker boy who is not good for me. Ugh. So I “happy smoke” when I am with him, and “sad smoke” when I am not. Fucked Up Love.
A few years back, a friend recommended I try her Juul. I did, and while it wasn’t doing the trick, I persisted, and over time, it did. Not only did it do the trick, as I stopped smoking cigarettes for any reason, happy or sad, I became a Juul addict. I was never addicted to cigarettes, or so I thought. I could take them or leave them. They would not occur to me if they did not occur to me and they just wouldn’t cross my mind. It would take a certain special circumstance (despair mostly) to tempt me. That or a friend who was smoking and it just sounded good (fun). It took a hell of a lot of sad or happy for me to actually purchase a pack and for the most part purchases were made in the name of sadness only. Malcolm Gladwell calls us “chippers” in one of his books, which I should probably cite if I want to publish this, but for now, that’s all I got. Chippers apparently don’t get hooked on nicotine. I should probably look it up just so I can speak to it more articulately. There is some reason, either physiological, emotional, or social, for this phenomenon. I am a chipper. Was a chipper. Until Juul. Juul was perfect. Doesn’t smell. Doesn’t leave the awful taste in your mouth. Didn’t affect my running. Seemed like a perfectly safe method of nicotine consumption, which despite the fact that I didn’t think I was addicted, was what I was after. I think. I still do not know what the fuck is going on. Is it possible that the addiction center in your brain becomes triggered when you are in certain emotional states? Nicotine, by the way, is shown to increase brain activity and mental acuity, in a good way. The problem with nicotine has always been the method of delivery. Eureka! I had found the perfect method of delivery. Nicotine-check. Oral fixation-check. Isn’t gross-check. Wrong. I am sure I don’t need to explain. Well, it took a minute but I quit.
I digress, but there is a point.
Fast forward to “said smoker boy” who is not good for me and my turn back to cigarettes. Which is gross. Even to me, the one who is smoking. Fast forward further to the present moment and, you guessed it, I decided to pick up a vape to quench my temporary circumstantial needs. This story isn’t over. Will I be able to break up with things that are not good for me?
Stay tuned.
Ps. maybe said smoker boy also needs to be a happy habit that i cheat on…?
