It was four years ago last night, November 10, 2006, that I had my last cigarette. I will celebrate this achievement tonight by getting completely shithoused. There’s nothing like forthrightly choosing a slightly less addictive way of killing myself to boost morale.
And it’s sort of true: It took no fewer than 50 tries to finally kick that fucker, 50+ moments of resolve shattered instantly or eventually, lowering the standard and poking holes in what once was a formidable will. The field goal in overtime may have won the game but the ranks were decimated long before that kicked cigarette split the uprights.
I can tell you exactly where I was when I flicked away the habit. I can also show you:
I was in Boston for a CD release show by a local band called Dear Leader. It was that ol’ Buffalo Gal who clued me into them, because the lead singer was originally from Western New York before settling in the Boston area (also living for a time in Belgium, the “Three B’s” being their axis of notoriety). They were playing the Paradise Rock Club, whose neighboring outfit you may recall from an earlier story. The girl couldn’t make it, but if memory serves my visit coincided with my annual fall trip north to visit BC alumni and to watch some football.
I love driving up to Boston that time of year, anywhere from early October to mid-November, because of the foliage and the spaciousness and usually the dampness. And I always loved roadtripping with coffee and cigarettes. They passed the time, they made it interesting. Instead of glazing over (as I do now, but safely) I was immersed in the experience and the competing drugs made it all so much more vivid.
Part of my trip that afternoon was a visit to Walden Pond. I’d always been a fan of the place, having been up when my sister was at school at BC. Reading excerpts from Thoreau’s journal in college made me feel closer to the area, and demonstrating my mostly unmuddied understanding of Walden on the comprehensive exam partially earned me my Masters degree. So whether it’s more symbolic or realistic, I’d had great respect for the place.
It was during that ’06 visit that I read for the first time an informational sign set up around the lake. Roland Wells Robins, of whom I’d never heard, was the one to discover the footprint of Walden’s cabin. I love stuff like that, but it was the date of it that struck me: November 11, 1945. The very next day would be the anniversary of its discovery. For a pensive, superstitious kind of guy, this detail was not lost on me.
Being already in a metaphorical state of mind, I took the coincidence to heart. I was always trying to quit smoking by then, so any particular thing might have worked. At this point I can’t neglect to mention also The Little Book of Quitting, by Allen Carr. But it was largely that connection, that intellectual-historical-personal-spiritual intersection, that finally did it. The next day, November 11, 2006, would be the return of my non-smoking life. I would symbolically “dig up” that healthy, unaddicted part of myself that had been buried and abandoned, and which had once been so hospitable and useful. This poetry went on because I was younger then and wasn’t so sheepish about it, but the fact that it all clicked is the important part. Moments like that don’t happen very often, I’ve found. I haven’t smoked a cigarette since.
Epilogues:
I once asked a co-worker to shotgun a puff for me at a Christmas party in 2007. It was my theretofore lowest ebb and I still owe her for declining that particular request.
I will occasionally hold cigarettes, manipulate them like a deck of cards, when other people have them on hand. Secretly I wish their concern to keep me from smoking will help them kick their own habit (but only those friends who have already professed a strong desire to quit).
I will, though rarely, smoke cigars. This was only after a period of great worry and reluctance and abstinence. It was as much the ritual and habit as it was the chemicals (or I could be lying) so the time between those cigars is long and integral.
The Dear Leader show was actually a hell of a lot of fun. There were no noticeable withdrawal pangs during the experience, which was fantastic and set me on my way. I wish I could see these guys more. This was their first song of the night, “Get Civil”: