Playa
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Posted: Mon Oct 03, 2005 8:08 am
Post subject: Smoking |
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I found this and thought it was cool.
| Quote: | At first, there aren't any "psychological" benefits. It's more of an instant physical gratification.You light that first cigarette (or ask your long-time smoker friend if you can have his, like my dumb ass did 3 years ago), and if you inhale correctly you'll feel it in seconds. It's a total rush, so disorienting that I've seen first-time smokers' knees give out. It doesn't last more than a few minutes though - quite crack-like in nature.
So you've had your first cigarette, and now you know how to smoke them right (its different from weed, for the uninitiated). If you're sufficiently young and stupid, you might even think you look "cool" (you don't, trust me, you look like an ASS to any non-smoker and a FOOL to any smoker who's ever thought of quitting). Your next cigarette buzz will be just as pronounced as the first, only this time you're expecting it - brace for the Gs. Enjoy it while it lasts.
I'm not sure how many it takes - less than a pack - but eventually that buzz starts to diminish. Now you learn tricks like packing your smokes to make them burn slower or hotboxing a cig to raise your nicotine levels more rapidly. So now you can almost get that first buzz back, but not quite. If you didn't have any vices before, you do now!
And that's when it's really got you - when you don't get a buzz anymore. You might be able to force yourself into a buzz by delaying the first cigarette of the day or by smoking more, but your ability to smoke Just One Today is gone. The next progression is to have a smoke after a meal, after sex, after this or that... then the excuse-list for when you'll let yourself smoke starts to look more like your daily to-do list.
So now you're a smoker. You ask for smoking when you eat out. You don't like going to movie theaters. Your work suffers because of all the smoke-breaks you begin taking. Your clothes, car, home, BREATH, FINGERS... YOUR WHOLE LIFE starts to smell like a cigarette. You start hacking up brown goo every morning. People know you're coming by your distinctive cough and odor. Your carpet has holes burned in it... in fact you burn your posessions on accident quite often. You become really resentful at the non-smoking world's prissy stuck-up laws.
NONE OF THE ABOVE IS EXAGGERATION!
Smoking has wormed its way into everything you do, and becomes a part of who you are. If the smallest stressor comes along, life throws throws the tiniest curve-ball your way, and you're lighting up. The nicotine causes a wave of "it's okay, it's okay, it's fine, it's okay" to flood over your brain... so long as you're smoking, you can't be bothered.
The first one in the morning becomes a ritual that can take often precedence over breakfast or even relieving yourself. If you have that first cigarette, you at first feel merely drained, like you haven't woken up yet. Coffee drinkers know the feeling. As the day goes on (actually, as the morning progresses to noon) you get progressively more irritable. "Hey there, how's it hangin?" "WHAT'S THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN, ASSHOLE!?" But if you just smoke a cigarette everything'll be okay... okay... fine... okay... ahhhh........
There's the psychological benefit - the cessation of an itch that's buried inside your skull. The only thing that scratches it is nicotine, and by the time you get there you KNOW this for a fact but can do nothing about it. You smoke to feel like YOURSELF, not to gain anything. |
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