Some Smokin’ History

I first smoke when I was 13, it was red, it was Marlboro. Some guys of my age started with Phillip which we branded cigar of the hooker because it is menthol thus mild. Red is also a sign of being macho, a chick magnet icon like the symbol of M. Country.
Listening in my bedroom to the music of Guns and Roses, and Bon Jovi, yeah, I begin with those glam rockers and there is nothing to be ashamed of. I remember myself being too emotional then, like playing Fake Plastic Tress of Radiohead for about 5 times straight, and my cigar hasn’t died out, just puffing now and then. Wow, my mind is floating and purging the negative emotions of the day.
We have hangouts, oftentimes its the mall because of Manila’s humid weather; SM Centerpoint in Sta.Mesa, Robinsons Galleria, Greenhills Virra Mall which is closest in San Juan where I spent my childhood years. We go in groups, I have my hiphop clique in my third year high school as we hang-out in Sta.Mesa. Smoking in the stairs, in the alleyways and in the toilets if it is cleared.
It is the sense of camaraderie, its hard to live each day if your alone (based in my experience of being a lone child).
Everyday my lungs could handle a pack of Marlboro, sometimes Winston if my allowance is running off. I only have about Php 30 bucks per day allowance for my expenses besides my fare. Marlboro is Php 20, Winston is just Php 18, the latter has a milder taste though.
We have a sari-sari store in our house, so when I am the purveyor, I just slip a pack in my back and my room becomes heaven through a bowl of smoke. Once my mother caught me smoking, while I am staring at the ceiling, daydreaming... she slapped me in the cheek without saying a word. Man, I could not speak or look her at the time when I came out of my room.
It’s hard to quit smoking because of the nicotine that is like handcuffs, you are tied to it once you get caught. There are times that I tried to quit like for about 2 months, but again I slipped into the smoke rings of my consciousness. Until I got into the straight edge movement which started by the hardcore band Fugazi with the slogan of: NO smoke, NO drinks, NO drugs, and NO fuck.
It is cool to be a straight-edger, suddenly my life has a bit of direction. Punks, rockers, my skater friends are into this straight edge thing, its nice, you put a pentelpen X mark on your wrist so the liquor vendor wont sell you any wine or any drinking beverages.
Hardcore straight edgers are vegetarians. My conciousness has been open into inquiries of cosmic realities, questions such as: Why do I exist? Why is my heart like a cyst, why don’t girls like me... am I such a dork?
Then, I came into contact with yoga, I finally quit smoking at the age of 19. I was a strict straight edger until I was 24 perhaps. In 2000, we relocated to Tabaco, Albay (Tabaco is so urbanized now being a city). Around 2004, man I got wasted again, smoking cigar and getting tipsy timely.
Now, its 2008, I am engaged to a girl whom I deeply love. At moments, mournful moments, I came back to my old destructive self, I am so blessed with Lyn at my side, she always tells me that she will also smoke if I lighted one.
...With her love and my desire to be fully clean again, I hope that I might also put a blockage to my drinking and my smoking rings.