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7 Things I Really Miss About Smoking

by Joshua Burt
3 January 2014 21 Comments

Here’s a short list of reasons why I was in love with cigarette smoking, all sadly countered by the sorry truth that if I’d carried on I’d feel really guilty about widowing my wife.

As the clock struck midnight to see out 2012 so ended my first completely cigarette-free year since 1988. Granted 1989 wasn’t a wild chainsmoking ride for me, partly because I was 12, and also because as I’ve literally just mentioned I WAS 12. But I had my first cigarette that year, kick-starting not just a habit but also a romance that went on for over twenty years. I absolutely loved smoking and if premature death weren’t a factor I’d smoke until the cows came home. I’d also chug away when they were at home pottering around and going “moo” at each other, and I’d definitely puff down a few tasty ones when the cows left for work the following morning. I’m a big fan. Here’s a short list of reasons why I was in love with cigarette smoking, all sadly countered by the sorry truth that if I’d carried on I’d feel really guilty about widowing my wife.

1. Imagine my face. Now imagine my face but smoking a cigarette. I’m literally ten times cooler and three times hotter.

2. Smoking punctuated my day, with work loosely planned around a series of nicotine fixes. The general rule was that I’d stand outside staring into the middle distance and sucking on a smouldering few-inch long stick like an action hero for ten minutes every hour. Passing girls would fall in love with me immediately, and those minutes would be the best of my day.

3. Once the pub ban was enforced, I fell even deeper in love with first gold B&H and then with Cutters Choice roll-ups, and for one simple reason – they’d get me away from awkward social situations. Stuck babbling to a stranger who obviously hates you? Just insulted a girl to the very core without entirely meaning to? Can’t be bothered to then backtrack and explain that she’s got the wrong end of the stick because life is just too short for that kind of thing? Great news, excuse yourself for a smoke. It’s slick, it’s sexy, and it’s a bit dangerous – both metaphorically and actually, in that it’ll eventually run rampant cancer around your lungs and destroy you..

4. Ah man, it was great when you could literally spark one up anywhere. Left hand side of the cinema, top deck of the bus, on actual aeroplanes, in restaurants. It was so liberating, the perpetual whingers were yet to have their day, and there was no better feeling than lighting up and leaning back to exhale a bellowing fog whilst midair. Be it on a plane. Or in one of those tall floating restaurants that were all fancy in the 1990s. On an open-top bus tour. At an IMAX cinema thing. If those existed back then. Which they clearly didn’t. (I’m sorry)

5. It’s not too much of a stretch to suggest that most of my relationships with girls have been loosely linked to smoking, in some cases they’ve come about as a direct result of sharing cigarettes. The reason’s simple – a conversation which includes a cigarette immediately takes on a deeper, more candid intimacy. I have no idea why that is, it just is. It probably has something to do with a shared love of throwing caution to the wind. Or star signs.

6. I could make a roll up in thirteen seconds from a standing start – I once even called the Guinness Book of Records to see what they had to say about it. They politely suggested that I fuck off and tag 5.7 trillion wooden pegs to my face if I really want something to brag about.

More…

I Was A 13 Year Old Tobacco Baron 

10 Ways To Carry On Smoking

7. I adored the smell of stale smoke, and couldn’t understand why people complained about having it on their clothes. If it were a toss up between that and any number of Lynx incarnations or even the sweet erotic perfume of a kindly bartendress, I’d still rather slather myself in eau de B&H. In a completely unlinked further fact of self-indulgence I also enjoyed the various different lighters you could afford yourself as a smoker. My personal favourite was a classic Bic, preferably in yellow. Like this:

But now I’ve given up. After numerous attempts, trying out newfangled methods like hypnotism (massive waste of time and money) and willpower (enormous waste of emotion), I popped myself on a program which involved weaning off the things with an arm-patch and had them beaten in about six months. This means I no longer crave them physically, but I do sometimes look out of the window at the groups of addled smokers backing and forthing with their uncomfortable paranoid banter and wish I was in amongst them. Back with my people. I’m also yet to find such a fail-safe reason to exit a conversation, having figured that there are only so many times I can pretend to need a piss before everyone assumes I’ve got a coke problem. I’m still working on that. However, I now sleep easy knowing that if I do die early it’s not entirely my fault. Plus I’ve started running – this is something I’d never even have contemplated between 1989 and 2011. A few kilometres every couple of days is just about keeping me at my smoking weight. Almost.

So there, every smoke cloud has a silver lining. Which is possibly the shittest sentence I’ve ever used to bring a self-indulgent me me me piece to a close. Cheers.

 

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image descriptionCOMMENTS

Frosty 7:05 am, 4-Jan-2013

If everybody gave up then the income tax rate would need to be about 95%. So stop being such a selfish bastard and get back on the cancer sticks and save me a tax hike.

Joshua Burt 9:46 am, 4-Jan-2013

Frosty, I'll do it if you promise me I won't die

Lee Barratt 12:03 pm, 4-Jan-2013

This is the best thing I've read in months, and as someone who is surrounded by these white shitting sticks everyday, I feel a massive craving to knock one of these back.

JC 1:12 pm, 4-Jan-2013

Never an ex-smoker, always a smoker 'in remission'. Which is what I am trying to be now, after over 30 years on the damned sexy, murderous things.

mart 1:47 pm, 4-Jan-2013

smoked for 31 years, gave up one year ago, I miss it everyday

andy 1:10 am, 5-Jan-2013

The unsung hero alright. Quit last month,can't say I can't live without, but it's one of those things I know I'll always come back to. There's just so much good you know the non-smokers will never understand.

Cecilia 5:25 am, 5-Jan-2013

This article is brilliant and sums up how I feel. I stopped - cold turkey - last June, exactly 7 months ago and still feel sad. Cravings gone but it's like losing an old friend. Hope to stay off them for obvious reasons but know I will always be tempted.

Alex 5:50 pm, 6-Jan-2013

Just as I read 'deeper, more candid intimacy' .. careless whisper by george micheal came on the radio. I sparked up a tab

Washishu 3:11 pm, 10-Feb-2013

Golden Virginia, Green Rizlas, lit with a Zippo: aaah, bliss. How you can, apparently, be so crass as to use a disposable I don't understand. Twenty five years with, just three without. I'm tempted every time I pass the "kiosk" in a supermarket. It's easier now that they're hidden away, but I still know they're there.

G 10:44 am, 16-Jul-2013

"But now I’ve given up. After numerous attempts, trying out newfangled methods like hypnotism (massive waste of time and money) and willpower (enormous waste of emotion" - fantastic! I gave up 6 weeks ago today so I'm still very much in the mourning stage. Agree with the running bit too, I used to just be unfit on the inside, now I look unfit if I don't go running! Farewell, nicotine, my old friend. Golden article, cheers!

Amy 10:48 am, 16-Jul-2013

Thanks, I enjoyed that. I stopped due to pregnancy and for my children (but must confess to a sneaky social one late at night on rare occasions). I'll always miss it, once a smoker always a smoker, but the lungs feel good for not doing it and I don't know how I used to have one first thing in the morning - blurgh.

patrice aurousseau 8:12 am, 12-Aug-2013

EXCELLENT! i'll have a fag and coffee now

thomas j thompson 5:23 pm, 12-Aug-2013

After 50 years of smoking I thought time to knock it on the head ,so after 5 month's still going strong,just proves that even I can give up and that's the biggest surprise to me as I thought that willpower was something only other people had....So to all who are trying to give up good luck...To those who are thinking about it no time like the present...Loss the smoke keep the FIRE.....

Martin Quirk 4:48 am, 28-Sep-2013

I gave up after 26 years over 5 years ago. I don't miss smelling like a filthy twat. I don't miss burning the £12 I spent every day on 40 B&H. I don't miss the sound of my lungs wheezing when I'm lying in bed. I don't miss having to stand outside buildings in the wind and rain like a helpless junkie knobhead. I don't miss not being able to taste my favourite meals properly. I don't miss films at the cinema being spoiled by the over-whelming urge to go outside and have a fag. I don't miss cigarettes.

Henry 9:45 pm, 5-Nov-2013

Its that first cig on a morning that i miss most, especially in the winter... stepping bleary-eyed into the cold and swallowing down that first delicious lungful of smoke. Or walking home late at night - in fact, walking anywhere now seems totally pointless without smoking. Like you, if i knew it wouldnt kill me id be back on tomorrow.

Max 7:46 pm, 14-Jan-2014

I feel for you, I've quit for about 2 years and I get occasional craving where I just dig deep inside and find the strength to keep on the smoke-free life i've chose over a sickening slowly dying , guilty life that put my family well being in jeopardy due to the health risk .... but yeah.... a harmless cig would get me right back on, I loved it.

Phil 1:58 am, 16-Jan-2014

Am at just under 2 months, and decided to use a major surgery and hospital stay under the influence of mega pain meds to get me thru the initial stages of quitting. That worked, but now, at 42 and after quitting all the other fun things i ever did...I begin to wonder if living to be old is really worth it when it seems so boring and lacking in flavor. sigh.

Stan Dalglish 8:19 pm, 23-Feb-2014

I packed the in back in 1997 and best thing I ever did.

Stan Dalglish 8:20 pm, 23-Feb-2014

I packed them in back in 1997 and best thing I ever did.

mimi 9:40 pm, 15-May-2014

Like you, I started smoking young (14 years old). I'm still young (16 years) and have been clean for 2 weeks. Its fucking torture but this article keeps me thinking that quitting does have some benefits, I guess lol

Peter 6:04 am, 22-Feb-2015

I was a pack a day smoker for two years. Started to cope with stress and all of life's issues. But stopped after I got married, my wife gave me the ultimatum either her or the cigs and that was that. We've been married for 5 years and have two kids. I think about smoking all the time. Coffee, alcohol, and sex have never been the same. The possibility of dying a painful death and leaving my family behind keeps me from lighting up. I'm glad I quit.

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