Let's be honest, cigarettes are awful, they really are. I've been a dedicated smoker for, ashamedly, over a decade, despite knowing the health risks and the financial hazard. There are no positives for smoking, there really aren't, and this is me saying this, Fag Ash Lau! Let's see, you smell, you get stained teeth, you pay a fortune to get these things and ironically spend another fortune buying perfumes and aftershave and teeth whitening products trying to counter act the effects. Your clothes reek, your hair reeks, your face looks ashen grey and unhealthy, your lungs don't thank you for smoking, you are inhaling poison straight into your body, your blood supply is being choked on a regular basis, your energy levels drop considerably, you get light headed and headachey, you get cravings for poison, and narky when you don't get to satisfy your addiction. Knowing all those things and more, why am I sitting her fantasising about smoking.
The horrible thing is, ciggies go with tea, they go with a drink, they go with tea break, lunch times, after dinner, after sex, after bad news, after good news, at the end of your working day, reading, waiting etc and even though I can a logical and rational adult by times, not having a cigarette for the above activities is proving extremely difficult for my brain to reconcile. It's all I can do to not run to the shop across the road and buy my Marlborough Lights and sit out in my garden and smoke one and wait for the crushing guilt to consume me. I did run to the shop a while ago, just for something to do, and bought my self some biscuits and a magazine, neither of which I wanted but both of which I have made good inroads into. Why am I finding this so difficult?
I know that there are people who have never smoked and are perfectly happy in their everyday lives and do something about their boredom instead of fidgeting and fixating on the nicotine fix. So why can't I? As I sit here and type, my cup of tea is looking accusingly at me, being unimpressed that it doesn't have a cigarette accompanying it, only peanut butter biscuits, it's in a huff with me for not bringing it on a journey from my living room to the garden. As non-smokers (or never smokers) people are quite happy to stay inside on these cold wintry evenings, so why I am driving myself mental to go out into the dark and cold and smoke...
Having been an ex-smoker for all of nearly two days, I am already feeling the benefits of it, I really am. My hair doesn't smell, I don't look so grey of face, my teeth are less yellow (the inordinate amount of tea I drink helps the staining!) my energy levels are at warp speed, I was able to run at the gym on Monday, something I hadn't done since my, ahem, training for the London Marathon back in 2010, I also was not totally ready to sell my soul for more sleep this morning when I woke up, my skin is softer, the remnants of my tan from my holiday is back, I can cycle up Tooting High Street hill without wanting to just fall off my bike in exhaustion, I am happier. I am, I am, I am pretty feckin' miserable too!
Seeing people on street corners waiting for buses, clients, or friends as they place the filter between their (chapped) lips is hard to take. Smelling that freshly lit cigarette makes me almost drool at the mouth. Walking behind someone who is smoking on the street turns me into a type of smoking Hannibal Lector following them at close range and sucking the smoke in through my mouth. If you are a smoker, just take a quick glance behind you every so often for fear of being stalked for your precious... I love not smoking, I love not being beholden to nicotine, I love smelling nice and not needing to smoke, I love having energy (some of you yes, I can hear you grumbling about my extra energy) and without smoking I am now like Tigger bouncing around the place. So why do I feel so despondent without them?
I want to be outside inhaling the poison, feeling the smoke swirl in my mouth and down my neck, hitting my lungs and then coming back out after a deep inhale. I want to be outside smoking. I want to be outside with my tea reeking of fags. But then I don't, I really don't. I will feel bad for smoking, I will think that I've messed it all up and might as well go back to the shop and stock up. I want to taste the disgusting smoke flavour in my mouth, but on the other hand I want to retain my fresh mint breath! I want to be outside in the smoking area coz we all know on nights out, that's where all the fun is. But then I want to not have second hand cigarette smoke on me when we troop back into pub. Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrgh it's tough. But why! Why is it so tough to choose between killing myself consciously inhalation after inhalation, and healthy clean and lovely smelling things? Why is my seldom used logical side arguing with my often used fanatical side over this? Why is it so hard to say no? Why do I try to make myself feel better by taking a look at a celebrity who is a known smoker and go look at her, she looks fine and she's on forty a day, not a wrinkle at her, when there are walking living advertisements for the dangers of smoking all around me. I don't want to be an addict any longer, and that's what I am, a smoking addict. I think about them all the time, I am actually driving myself simple with lust and longing for a smoke. Why can I not say no to foul smelling, evil, poisonous, expensive cigarettes! There are no pros for smoking, only cons. And there are no cons for not smoking, only pros. So why is this proving the toughest challenge I have ever faced?
All I can do is try. And God loves a trier doesn't he?
p.s. Soon after this piece was finished,our hero Laura caved and went across the the road to the shop and bought some cigarettes. Last seen in her garden in Tooting with an oncoming smoking headache and a sheepish guilty look on her already guilty looking face.
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