Yesterday, Billy and I celebrated six months of non-smoking. Just like kicking any bad habit, it feels like a proper milestone to celebrate. It was no small feat for those who know me and my tendency to smoke cigarettes like a gambler plays the slot machine. There was always justification for, "just one more". As if the moments adding up under the swell of cigarette smoke would lead me to a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow, or summon the next mark of brilliance like famous parisian smokers Jean-Paul Sartre, Coco Chanel or Serge Gainsbourg. It started at the age of sixteen when such grand illusions were set before me. It had been a year of sneaking cigarettes with friends in the suburbs; naively drinking coffee in the stifling smokers section at Denny's, convinced the coffee would somehow mask the stench embedded in our clothes and breath.
I saved up my babysitting money to go on an educational tour of France with my french class. Brimming with excitement, history and culture finally at the tip of my fingers, I had only one thing in mind. I couldn't wait to sit independently at a sidewalk cafe, drink wine and smoke cigarettes among the parisians. I made sure this happened, even if I had to secretly escape from my more amateur company. Unfortunately, my unhealthy conviction started a trend amongst the other teens on the tour bus and it became equally important to translate "How much for the Gouloises" as "Where are the toilets?".
From there, sitting on patios and enjoying the company of friends became an extremely dedicated pastime in my adult life. It must have unleashed my fetish for seeking quaint outdoor patios and/or restaurants with open windows no matter where I landed. I could sniff them out like a bloodhound to a missing person. Ironically, I now live in a city that has a serious lack of patios (with a few magical exceptions). My front porch more than makes up for it, but I am starting to wonder if I will sit on my porch nearly as much as I used to when I was a smoker. Contemplation is a lonely thing without something occupying my idle hands. Soaking up the sun in front of an establishment suddenly looks suspicious without the passive recognition of a smoker doing their thing.
It's possible that the tobacco farming of my great grandparents may have slightly predetermined my addiction. It could have been my childhood memories watching grandpa Grover lean over the kitchen sink in great distinction with his filterless cigarette while looking out the window over his gigantic garden. Or maybe it was catching Mom alone with an occasional lit one in the middle of the night on the front stoop coupled with a bourbon and seven when she couldn't sleep. Hypocritically, when too young to fully understand the whole concept of smoking, I once hid the Merits from my "bio-dad" and asked him what kind of flowers he wanted at his funeral.
Whatever it was, we are now happy to be considered non-smokers. Billy prefers that it's forever and claims I should go a year before ever putting one to my lips again. But, if I find myself in Europe again, please don't judge me if I ceremoniously light one up as if saying hello to an old friend.
In honor of the movie size memories I have of my smoking days and the paradoxical comfort, camaraderie and romanticism I still associate with it, I will leave you with this:
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