I stopped smoking around 2002. It was a simple gesture, me standing there at work, willingly giving my pack of Camel Lights to whoever wanted them. There was no real craving, no want to smoke again. But there was one thing I couldn’t drop, my lighter.
I carried my lighter after that pretty much everywhere. Leaving the house it was the first thing in my pocket and after the day the last thing I counted along with my wallet, keys and loose change. I carried to to bars, to my parents house, checked it on flights. But when people asked I smoked I said no, but always produced a lighter just in case. It was a strange thing being able to let go of something that’s proven to have a grip on the public.
Honestly, I still love the smell of smoke. I smell it in people’s hair, on their jackets. The waft when you leave a building or lingering in the stairwell on your way out. To walk past buildings and see a group huddled on a street corner. It’s just the love of the faintly sweet scent that gets me. There’s no Proustian memory associated with it, no relative moment, and I still carry a lighter with me.
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