Poetry & Blindfolds

I have not written about stopping smoking since May 2009 because I find writing about smoking tends, sooner or later, to make me want to have a cigarette to celebrate not smoking. 

Since May, I continued my use of Chantix, that wonder drug.    I gave up counting the hours between my last cigarette and “now”, whenever “now” was, after I reached 100 hours.   The desire went away, as did my desire for writing, working on music, etc., as I tended to associate being creative and having a cigarette smoldering in the background, like some nicotine muse.  Whenever friends or associates would ask me what play or song or sketch I was working on, I’d say, ‘nothing, I’m just being a normal person for a while.’  Although true, I realized that being a normal person was pretty boring.   The dance of wake/work/eat/sleep is just horrifying – and nearly as addictive as cigarettes.

I had surgery in the middle of May 2009 as part of my Vincent Truman Faces His Fears World Tour.  I was terrified of going to the doctor while I felt fine – doctors are, after all, paid to take care of problems, so they are highly motivated to find them.  My general physician found a couple of doozies: hernias and moles!   For the latter, some nice doctor cut one off and did a biopsy – all clear.  For the former, I was cut open and some other nice doctor rolled mesh along my insides so said insides wouldn’t come outside.

More details of my post-op experience can be found here:
http://www.vincenttruman.net/blog/2009/05/25/post-op-blues-and-purples/

Still, I continued to not smoke.

Somewhere in June, I got off Chantix and experienced horrific side effects – made horrific by the fact that I didn’t know they were side effects.  I felt out of sync with the world, and seemed to walk around in a semi-dream-like state.  I had a panic attack.  I had a few near panic attacks.  In fact, I was convinced I was on the precipice of going mad outright.  At work, the general incompetence of the staff had been amusing; due to my detoxing (unknown to me at the time, I should point out) I let a stray “I’m sick of this fucking department” escaping my lips.  Of course, I was trotted down to Human Resources so the Human Resources person could say “fucking” back to me.   It is an odd thing about my job that, on both occasions someone has reported me for saying “fucking”, the HR person seems compelled to say “fucking” back to me, as if the word would make me realize the error of my ways and go, “Oh my, did I really say that?  I’m so sorry.”  At least this time around, the HR person didn’t feel compelled to say “fucking” no less than 10 times, like the time before.

During my detox, I was also doing a bit of Vicodin (from the surgery), so I was quite a mess.  Even when I was involved in the 24 Hour Play thing (http://www.vincenttruman.net/blog/2009/07/06/the-24-hour-plays-blog/), I was still a little out of it.

In early July, I seemed to emerge back out of the glorious fog of prescription medications and back into the real world.  My desire to write and work with music came right back, as did – you guessed it – a lust for the nicotine muse to accompany me.  The only difference now is that I often forget about cigarettes and when I do think of them, I have a take-or-leave feeling unless they are right in front of me.  If someone is smoking in front of me, my eyes follow the Burning Cherry of Desire wherever it goes.   Despite the predominant absence of cigarettes in my life and lungs, though, all is not rosy:

**I have stolen a cigarette or two from my girlfriend’s bag.  

**I did buy a pack one day.  Had one.  Left the pack in some public area where hopefully some child will find it.

**The girlfriend smokes on the back deck of our apartment.  I do wander out there more often then usual and see if she’s left any butts large enough to smoke.

To counter this, I am talking a little bit more to people about not smoking.   I figure, if one person knew I wasn’t smoking, no one would care if I had a cigarette.  But if everyone knows, then it weighs on my mind more and I don’t smoke.  Such a petty, stupid game, yes, but I don’t want to smoke again.  Even if lung issues might show up in my later years now, the chances decrease if I don’t smoke and increase if I do.  I try and keep that in the forefront of my mind. 

Time to use some old fashioned transferance.  Who needs a cigarette?  I’m a-gonna have me a few bowls of cereal!