Of my many vices and antics, the one vice I would like to get a grip on is smoking.
I actually started smoking when I was sixteen because it was the cool thing to do. As much as people don’t want to admit it, smoking looks cool. James dean looked cool, the Dice man looked cool, Uma Thurman looked cool in Pulp Fiction, the reason they have those gross anti smoking commercials is to make smoking not look cool.
Nobody starts to smoke for the taste, they taste horrible and by the time you want to stop the nicotine fix has got you, you start to smoke because of fitting in with your peers and the cool factor.
As I said I started smoking when I was sixteen and I quit when I was twenty. I also did it when I was running a fence carpentry shop while we were in season and I was busy and stressed but I quit cold turkey. The reason was, I did not want to smoke anymore and I loved to run and wanted to do that more and lose weight.
From nineteen eighty two until two thousand and seven I did not smoke, twenty five years smoke free.
What happened?
Well, in two thousand seven I was a year away in my plan to go full time into comedy and take the leap that everyone of my peers and close personal friends have taken. Due to unseen circumstances that plan was curtailed as well as my first shot in an acting career. The result has been in a position during the day that has since left me in a deep depression.
I am not complaining, nor am I am looking for sympathy as every waking moment I work to change that, but none the less the depression and frustration is there.
Compounding the situation for past three years my marriage as a lot of people know is on the rocks and is on the way to coming to a close.
So where do I find comfort from this? Drinking? Well don’t let the compound pictures you see on Face Book fool you, yes I am drinking beer and Jack on the rocks until sunrise but that is not all the time and frankly I don’t really drink besides those parties.
Drugs legal or otherwise??,,, absolutely not.
What gets me through this? Cigarette time or as we say in the band Race Odyssey “Smokey, Smokey”. Yes gang, what gets me through the tough times is a pack of Swisher Sweets Strawberry cigars or Marlboro Black 100’s.
I do want to quit as the way my luck goes, as soon as my career hits I will drop dead from cancer.
But here is the difference of quitting versus back then, thirty two years ago I wanted to quit, my problem now is I like to smoke. I look forward to it on the way to work, at lunch, on the way home, after a set at the club, during a break on the Den, at Band practice which is essentially a smoke cloud with music coming out of it.
I know smoking is bad it makes me wheeze, upsets my stomach, and is expensive. When I started when I was sixteen a pack of smokes was Fifty Five cents. You can’t get matches for that now.
After this past holiday, I decided I was going to quit or cut down drastically. Here is what happened.
I had my “last” cigarette, I then proceed to have a day from hell and then the daily depression sets in being in a place where I do not want to be.
I am still holding strong, the last straw is getting a call from my oil company telling me I owe two hundred fifty dollars more than the huge check I just mailed to them at lunch.
That’s it I went to Seven Eleven and got myself a nice new pack of Marlboro black 100’s to calm my ass down.
On the way home I am beating myself up for falling back on smoking.
As I pull up to my house I see signs all over my Lawn that the” Mosquito Squad” has been at my house and sprayed and I need to stay away.” Who the hell is the Mosquito Squad”??
I didn’t ask the Mosquito squad to come by, to add to this my stupid neighbor starts busting my balls as to why I asked the Mosquito squad to come.
I then told him one more word out of him and he is going to need the police squad to come. Go in your house and shut your face stupid.
The answer to this is my ding rod Wife who is now going to have a Mosquito Squad sign sticking out of her ass when she gets home.
Mean while to calm my ass down I have been smoking like a diesel train.
As a matter of fact I need one now.
Well tomorrow is another day, wish me luck Smokey, Smokey.