Smoking is a demon of habits. It invades the darkness and curling reaches of mundane ritual. You notice a thousand-fold the power of your own routine when you put down your last cigarette. You realize how almost every moment of your day is centred around when you’re going to smoke next. You wake up and have fifteen minutes of extra time because thats when you used to smoke. So, you pace back and forth and try to avoid the thoughts of smoking. Half hour breaks from work are devistating, because you have no clue what “normal” people do for that half an hour. You constantly figit at the bar with beer in your hand, because you don’t know what your free hand should be doing.

Sure I’m wearing the patch, and trust me it works wonders. I really have no cravings for cigarettes. I simply keep forgetting that I no longer smoke. And thats the crux of the situation; wrapping your head around the fact that you DON’T smoke. Smells start getting stronger and things start tasting completely different. Everywhere you go you stare loningly at people who are smoking, because you miss the smell and taste and power of a simple tube of plant matter.

I equate quitting smoking to deciding not to eat ever again. You’re alright for the first couple hours. Heck, you could probably make it for a good twelve hours. However, there is this growing feeling of emptiness within your body. You become weak and nauseous…you have troubles standing or staying awake. Your stomache physically hurts. Say you even make it a couple weeks without eating. Your body kicks in with natural, automatic instincts that basically force you to eat. Resisting is nearly impossible, nor is it possible to function in life.

However, with the patch, its like deciding not to eat ever again, but still taking pills that give your body every nourishment it needs to survive and function. Even though its possible, you still have that dark, painful, empty feeling in your stomache as it cries out for something to fill it. Your brain starts craving the taste of certain foods.

Now, it may seem wierd that I’m going on and on about these feelings (and just so you know I’ve made it this far without slipping, and I’m still going strong), but when I went out with a group of friends tonight to the coffee shop, I had these same strange feelings of being empty dark down inside me. Don’t get me wrong, I care about these people, but sometimes they seem as though they too are just a patch that I’ve placed over my life for something I truley crave.

I feel so much of an outsider now to most of my gay friends, when in the past I was the wild, crazy, party animal leader. I was the one in the middle of fifteen people hogging all the attention and demanding everyone loves me. Now, fastforwarding to three years later, I’m the one sitting at the bench watching traffic go by and wondering what exactly changed in myself. I rarely find myself interested in the hypersexual talk and banter and gawking my friends do. I can’t relate to their stories of threesomes and drug induced evenings. I just stare far away and lose myself to a blank mind.

I know I’ve become a completely different person in the last few years. However, for some reason, I can’t seem to put a finger on exactly what is different about me. I can’t figure out who exactly I’ve become. I can’t discribe my personality, where as I used to be able to list it like memorized song lyrics. I’m no longer lost, and inbetween events, or at the bottom of the pendulum. Instead, I’m just beginning to reach a new part of a journey, and I haven’t had much time to explore my surroundings yet.

As for my friends, I’m sick of blaming myself. I used to say that I was afraid to get close to people. I used to claim that I couldn’t be close friends with someone who I didn’t want to fall in love with - intertwining the two like ribbon. Now, I say its my friends. Not that they’re bad to me, but I chose them and perhaps they just aren’t the right people for me. I care for them on the inside, but on the outside I couldn’t care less. I love them spiritualy, but not on the levels of mundane existence and routine.