Saturday, March 04, 2006

...on camel lights

I haven't smoked a cigarette since Thanksgiving Day, big whoop. Bronchitis overcame the urge to kill myself. And even though I still haven't completely recovered from it, when I have felt like I would enjoy smoke, I have refrained without as much as a whimper from my former card-carrying member of the Black Tar society self. I mean I used to keep the good citizens of Winston-Salem , NC in fine shoes and jackets with the cigarettes I smoked, so doing the old heisman to an urge is saying something.

I went out last night for the first time in a while. Bronchitis and lack of money aside, I work for living and this body can only take so much. I figured a couple of beers and some pool, (which I hadn't played since the days of Ur) would do some good for my tired old bones. Man alive, did I want a cigarette. Not because of how it makes you feel when pull in a nice drag, or the fact that it gives you something to do in between conversations, but more because when I play pool, the cigarette has always been part of the uniform. Having it dangle out of my mouth as I lay my hands in position and look over the table at the next shot, the obligatory drag and exhale before I shoot, resting it on the side of the table in preparation of a difficult shot, making the shot, picking up the smoke and repeating the steps.

Dean Thrilla said to me during our last trip to the mountains that he thought I smoked due to my pyromaniacal tendancies. When camping I am in control of the fire from start to finish, fuck that, I am the fire and the fire is me. He said that in smoking each cigarette I was in a way taming the beast within, not that I was going to go out on an arson binge but It was an interesting theory. Last night sort disproved that a bit. I'm still a pyro, but man, it was just plain weird playing pool without a cigarette. It took a couple of games to shake off the rust of not playing for a while, and another couple to get over the fact that I was playing naked--sans cigarette that is. For a minute I was actually entertaining the thought that the reason I was having a rough start on the table was that I wasn't smoking. Needless to say it was my most difficult test since quitting, but I passed. And by the end of the night I put a hurting on all comers just like the days of old. I still got it.

This morning I awoke to that heavy lung feeling you get when you smoked too many cigarettes the night before, turns out I did smoke--everybody elses cigarettes. Damned smokers. Ain't karma a thing.

mofo

2 comments:

bastard central said...

now here's the funny part for the bastard. on you last post, you spelled disappoint and disappoinment (don't bother checking, it was corrected —ed) the wrong way but, you get pyromaniacal right out the box. you shoulda been an editor man. later for all this electrical hoo hah.

funny you should wake up with secondhandedness in your lungs. karma is a bitch goddess. kinda like workers compensation

—b

Anonymous said...

I knew someone would make mention of Pyromaniacal.