Nowadays my answer became “rarely”. How rare? Very, very.
The first time I puffed the awful cigarette was when I was in my elementary years. That was only once. It was during one of those times when there are a lot of people in our house. I can’t remember what the occasion was but I know there was some celebration.
As a kid, my parents would shoed me to some corner, didn’t want me to disturb them to what they were doing (cooking, entertaining visitors, etc.). I was with four others of my cousins almost the same age as me. We were at the corner playing, talking and laughing … when one of us noticed the box of cigarette. The oldest of our group got one and said “let’s try it?” Well, I know it’s not allowed to us, and that our parents would get angry if they found us with that stick, but curiosity is a strong motivator, so why not? So we did, light one and passed along the stick to each one of us. I don’t think we finished that one stick though. It was awful and irritating.
I never tried it again since then, well, until now.
I used to hate cigarette, alcohol and any other vices. I set it as one of characteristics of a guy that I want as a partner … no cigarette, no alcohol, no drugs and no gambling. The first thing that I would ask a guy who would ask to court me is “Do you smoke/drink?” I wouldn’t turn them down if they do, but that would be a minus point.
But what change? What drives me to try those things I despise? The answer? I don’t know. Curiosity, maybe? The hunger for adventure? The wanting to “test or try”? Maybe one of those, or all of those. But I do smoke now, very rarely and drink occasionally.
I say very rarely because, I don’t smoke just because I want to. There are times that I think I crave to do so. Mostly I do crave to smoke whenever I am very depressed or very sad. But even if I do crave I wouldn’t do it immediately. I wouldn’t smoke if a member of a family is there to see me smoke, I don’t want them think I do smoke. I wouldn’t smoke if there are people seeing me smoke, I want to do it alone, or rather if the people around were strangers. I don’t know why, but I don’t want anybody I know, or anybody who knew me, see me puffing those awful stick.
I am aware of the dangers of smoking and drinking, that’s why I am very careful of overtaking it. I know that tobacco is the main content of cigarette, so I want to learn more about it, and how it can be dangerous or what are the benefits from it [tobacco] if there is. I want to know what is there in cigarette that people couldn’t resist, couldn’t stay away from it.
But though I am just starting to learn to smoke..I want to quit it already, too. ^_^
