No Smoking? HELP!!!!

I am from North Carolina and as of January 1, 2010, NC banned smoking inside all public buildings. Well, that really applied to restaurants and bars. It has been years since you could smoke in a store or service building. But if you were an avid smoker and out-to-eater like I was, it felt like my home state was taking away one of my favorite past times. So I did what any sane person would do, I moved to South Carolina where they hadn't banned the good ole smokers!

Just a brief back story.... I am from a family of hard core smokers. If money gets tight, things like eating would come after buying smokes. I know we are a smart bunch! The same week I annonced to my father I was a smoker, my aunt was diagnosed emphysema. I tell you, we are all scholars! I have been smoking a pack a day at least since I was twelve years old. They were very available to me and back then you could go to the store, tell them your mom wanted a pack and as long as you had the cash, you had the smokes. And to pay for my newest hobby, I saved my lunch money.

Now to more recent times.... I have smoked for 20 years! Which isn't half of the time of most of my family. My step mother had half of one of her lungs removed in 2010. Wake up call? Nope, I was stressed, I needed a cigarette! Funny how we justify are actions when we know they are wrong. It wasn't until a few weeks ago, sitting in class, learning something completely unrelated that I was wakened from my smokers dream.

I have an awesome teacher in a class called College Skills. She honestly wants the best for her students and provides life changing information through this varied topic class. While learning the food industry of the US and the many, many reasons not to meat or non grass feed meat, a light bulb appeared over my head. I couldn't justify smoking any longer. Which worried me, I needed a smoke now for sure.

After class, I went outside to smoke with my roommate that attends college with me. I started talking about the undenable facts that had been rained upon me and a horrible realization I had made myself. I hated selffish people. Here I was being the biggest hypocrite I know, which was another trait that irrated me! I am not scared of death and we all have to die from something, at least by smoking I was choosing my mode of death. Ugh!!! That was actually how I made it okay to be a smoker! Now for the AWESOME REALIZATION! I was being selffish by smoking. I was taking away hours with every cigarette I smoked, from the people, few as that may be, that wanted and needed me in their lives.

With every drag, I was ending my life earlier. I was telling this to my roomate that is my best friend and a person you wants and needs me in their life. My eyes filled with tears and I decide right then and there; I am done smoking! Now, with that being said, I had a half of a pack left and throwing them away was not an option. I smoked until I went to bed that night and saved one for the morning cigarette. Which if you are a smoker, you know the morning smoke is one of the most important ones.

I arose from dream land around sevenish the next morning. After counting the hours from when I stopped I hadn't had a cigarette in seven and a half hours. I was asleep for six of those hours but hadn't smoked either way. When my best friend entered the living room around 9:30am, I had been smoke free for nine and a half hours. That was when I decided not to smoke that last one. I had almost ten hours under my belt! If I smoked that last one, I'd start all over again. And how bad a$$ would it be to have that last cigarette and be able to say I've had it for x amount of time, years down the road when I told my "quitting smoking" story.

Eleven days have passed since that morning..... I still have that cigarette beside my bed. It is the last thing I see at night and the first thing I see in the morning. It is one of the smartest decisions I have ever made. And....Drum roll please..... The easiest to stick with!!!! Yes, I said easy! Once I made the connection from smoking to taking something away from my loved ones and all the other logical reasons, I can't with a clear conscience put that delicious cigarette to my lips. I still consider myself a smoker. You see, I love smoking!! I just don't practice the art anymore! Anyone want to sit in the smoking, non-practicing section with me.... It's time to eat!