My Smoking Story: How I Started

“It’s easy to quit smoking. I’ve done it hundreds of times.” Mark Twain I learned early in life that smoking was not good. And that I shouldn’t smoke cigarettes when I grow up. Everybody was telling me that. And I believed them because cigarettes stank. rnAlso the same everybody from the adult male world around me was smoking. The very people I would want to emulate either consciously or not – my father, my grandfather, my uncles, their colleagues and friends—was telling me that smoking was bad but was actually smoking himself. No matter the discrepancy between the words and the deeds, I listened to what the grown-ups said and I didn’t smoke. But on occasions, I tried. I started playing with the so-much-tempting symbols of masculinity at the age of 6. At the age of 7 I was caught by a security guard, when my cousins and I were smoking in the rose bushes of the school yard during the summer vacation. I was so ashamed that the guard would tell my parents about my misfortunate deed. I didn’t want to disappoint my Mom and Dad. So I stopped playing with cigarettes for some time. When I went to college at the age of 16, I found myself being away from my parents’ nest, and capitulated to the insidious temptation: I started playing with cigarettes in regular manner – once per week. I studied in the university. I lived alone. I was earning some money myself. I felt mature. I was embracing my adult life from all angles, except for the most natural ones. I felt I was grown-up. So I did what was natural to do for grownups – I smoked cigarettes. I remember how I felt the first several times of smoking a stick – sick. rnI recall how it was when I was having a couple – trouble. rnI evoke how I was when having three – catastrophe. rnSo I quit. I was not a smoker officially, but I had to quit playing. For the next 2 years I didn’t touch cigarettes, considering them the greatest source of evil existing. When I went studying to another country, where literally everybody around was smoking, something just snapped in my head: and in my second year of the university there I started again. First once per week, on Thursday nights, in the famous bar with a friend of mine, who was also a so-called social smoker, but in fact a starter. That was a real beginning of my real tobacco experience that would drag me to the swamp of the hard addiction for the next 10 years of my life. I remember how disappointed my father was when he found out I joined the club, and I told him “Don’t worry, Dad! I will smoke as long as I like smoking, and then when I don’t – I’ll just stop them.” It sounded so easy to an optimistic 20-year old boy who was not burdened by the experience of quitting trials that an average smoker has. Actually, this statement contained the whole truth to ceasing smoking, but I didn’t know it back then. So I started my smoking journey with uplifting spirit and full satisfaction from every puff I was making. Now finally I had made it: I was a big guy. That went on not for so long, as quite soon the boring routine of smoking started being burdensome to me. In about 2 years after I started, I quit. Being a strong man in my mind, I didn’t smoke any more. Any more meant for several days. Then, of course, I lit up again. I would realize many years later that I couldn’t cease smoking back then and several times after it, because I was not persuaded that I should stop. I knew cigarettes were not good for me, but they were still the symbol of masculinity, maturity, and success in an adult life. They became a forbidden fruit that was rotten on the inside, but kept staying shiny and luring on the exterior. After 5 years of daily engaging with cigarettes, occasional unsuccessful attempts to stop, I was feeling very well what effects they started having on my body. Regular expectoration was the most visible sign. The others were including but not limited too constant coughing without a reason, frequent catching of cold, and the distinct smell coming from the largest organ of the human body – my skin. rnI said to myself this could not continue like this! So I quit smoking once and forever! I was happily off the cigarettes, overwhelmed by the greatness of the smells around me , when my forever finished as surely as ever after 5 months. During that time I eradicated the plant of the physical addiction to nicotine from my body, but again I didn’t manage to wipe out the weeds of the mental dependency. Smoking continued to be the symbol of manhood, freedom, and success. rnI remember how my creative mind deceived me into persuading myself that I could smoke only 2 cigarettes per day – one in the morning and one in the evening. Only on these terms I was ready to rejoin the club. My mind promised me that this was it: I was not addicted to nicotine-–that was proven by 5 months of abstention—so I could smoke as much as to enjoy them again, like in the days when I had just started. I was so convincing, and the cigarettes were so enticing, that I willingly submitted myself. rnAnd I did stay on the prescribed dose of two sticks a day… for the first several days. But then gradually yet surely I started adding “one more” to the daily intake. Quite soon I was back to almost-a-pack-a-day smoker again. And I wouldn’t even make an attempt to quit smoking in the next 5 years. I was totally in the mercy of nicotine. rnIn a couple of years after this peak point, I started working for a multinational tobacco company. It was a smoking heaven or hell, depending on your perspective on cigarettes. For those in the game, like me, it was a paradise. For those out of it, the nonsmokers, it must have been a torture. I remember we smoked in the meeting rooms, in the smoking rooms, and even at our working desks after 6 pm. We had free cigarettes. We gave cigarettes. We were the walking cigarettes. Cigarettes became a part of my character. As part of my job, I was preparing presentations for our trade partners regarding the positioning of each brand and its difference vs. competition. That brand was innovative and trendy, and this one was refined feminine, that one was young and playful, and this one was modern classical. rnIt seems ridiculous. It is ridiculous. Tobacco marketing is the apogee of suggestion. Tobacco consumers are a good example of mental susceptibility. rnI was in and I was playing. Brainwashed to the marrow of my bones, I was a true ambassador. At the same time, the idea about quitting smoking gradually faded out as my whole life then had been revolving around cigarettes. How could I exclude them from it? I couldn’t. I didn’t. And, I didn’t want to. I liked smoking. I sincerely enjoyed it. Later on I found that most of the smokers enjoy smoking, as it alleviates the pains of nicotine cravings, giving a brief relief. So I was in, with no prospects for going out. At least, that’s what if felt like back then. I wished I hadn’t started.