Anniversaries

Unlike many created commercial holidays, I feel anniversaries have meaningful significance.

There are many kinds of anniversaries--some commemorating, some celebrating, some simply marking the passing of time...

An anniversary that I celebrated last week was one year cigarette-free.

Growing up with my dad and brother smoking in the house, I grew to hate cigarette smoke. Sometimes, I'd even be bratty enough to fake a cough when I felt annoyed by their smoking.

I never did tell my family that I smoked. And, sadly, even when my dad stopped smoking because he started having trouble breathing, I kept on smoking.

When I came out in college and started hanging out with other queer youth, I picked up smoking. There was this one coffee shop in Long Beach that we'd frequent in particular...we'd sit outside, nurse our cups of coffee (with cheap refills), smoke incessantly, talk, and just generally keep each other company--proving to ourselves and each other that none of us was alone. Sometimes, even after the coffee shop would close we'd sit on the curb, reluctant to leave one another.

When I started smoking, I started with cloves--to this day their smell brings me back to some of my fondest memories of warm nights in southern California. Then it was bidis, Shermans, my-own-rolled Drums, and then menthols...I never smoked a pack a day, but I was still a smoker.

Sometimes, I still feel like a smoker...still feel the pull of taking a deep drag...

But it's been over a year, now, without so much as a puff, and I couldn't be happier.

(Glad too, that other friends of mine are on the smoke-free journey. Not now, but maybe some other time I'll rant about the ways in which queer communities are disproportionately targeted and disproportionately suffer from nicotine, alcohol, and substance addictions.)

I got this t-shirt at the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force Creating Change conference years ago in Oakland, CA. Hopefully I've stopped in time to not have to miss my lung!