On Smoking

I started smoking cigarettes when I was seventeen, I think.

First, I wasn't able to procure any pot. I was zooming through my late adolescence, giggling and munching on snacks, sucking THC fumes through my bent tin cans and older brothers' bongs and learning how to choke back coughs. I tried a clove cigarette, loved it, and made that one of my cool things to do on the drive home from high school.

When the day came that the ultra-potent-sugary-sweet clove cigarettes led me to vomit in the preschool park down the road one drunken night, I decided to quit. At some point, someone offered me a cigarette. I always sniffed at the stale, chemical smell of tobacco. I tried it. And soon my clothes, my hair, my hands smelled of charred aromatics and I thought, "this isn't so bad."

It soothes your soul, to puff a cigarette. First, there may be a head rush. It can be wonderfully dizzy or terrifyingly woozy. The oxygen in your blood becomes lightly medicated. Maybe your heart rate slows a bit. Your windpipe scorches the first few times. Your mouth parches and tastes like charcoal. But your eyelids may relax and your fingers suddenly know how to flick off the ash and you take tiny drags, you exhale and your tongue is coated with a satisfying flavor. Like bacon, or miso soup. Nowadays, coffee and cigarettes taste and smell the same to me. There's a fine line that separates the rich, blackened aroma of roasting coffee beans and Marlboro Lights charring my insides.

You are able to shuffle into groups gathered, now able to participate in the inane chitchat that fills the smokers' circle. Take a cigarette break. Meet someone outside who's having one too. Share a lighter. Talk. Get a little tipsy at the bar and courageously ask someone to spot you a "stoge." Offer one up to a good looking person and smile bashfully when they thank you.  

Eventually you realize the magical effects of cigarette smoking while intoxicated. Breathing air alone is stupid when you can inhale nicotine. Cigarettes are the fuel a drunk person needs to keep going. It's like being wrapped in a warm blanket of fuck yeah. And with that, why smoke just one? You'll think, "Hell, I bought a pack of 20 of these things! I can just give a bunch of them away to people on the street and smoke the rest in rapid succession!" The drunkenness is intensified.

Then, if you're like me, there's the inevitable downfall of over indulgence. After burning cigarette after cigarette, the chances of all those toxins making you queasy reaches maximum potential. The delicious, smoky aroma morphs into a chemical stench. Maybe your stomach starts to flip from the excess mucus running down your burnt esophagus. I have spent some time hurling in the bushes after my last drag sent my dark and stormy back up the way it came.

Alas, we know it's bad for us. Smoking kills, stinks and can even risk the health of others. It turns your teeth yellow, sours your breath and eats up a sizable chunk of your cash. But for all of smoking's negative qualities, the dedicated tabagie still meet, commiserate and suck nicotine together. Whether you want to curb your appetite, calm your jitters or simply look fucking cool, I doubt we'll see the day cigarettes go out of style. So find your matches and escape to your quiet, happy smoker's lounge, wherever it may be.