Yeah baby its quite the high. :D

Artist:Natasha Sazonova

And one fine day I quit smoking just as suddenly I started smoking 4 and a half years back. No particular reasons as such. Hmmmm nobody asked/compelled me to nor did I promise anyone that I would and nor was it a new year resolution. Okie yes I have never been a compulsive smoker but at my peak I did smoke up to 10 a day and if we were out drinking or clubbing then like many other smokers I lost count. The smoking ban has helped tremendously cos I realized that I can be out drinking and having fun minus a cigarette. I remember a time 3 years back when I couldn’t dance without a cigarette in my hand and now it seems so so ridiculous. Why did I ever condition my mind to such an extent? Tsk tsk the follies of youth. Yes I make a confession that it did feel really cool scandalizing people in coffee shops when one was in college and you took out a smoke and started puffing at it under the angry glares of the older generation. I had tried to cut down on smoking a couple of years back since I got obsessed about working out and had gotten it down to one a day but failed inevitably as I was going out too often with a bunch of people who smoked and drank excessively. Yes peer pressure does exist. Nobody ever forces you to smoke but unconsciously you become like the others.
So here I am and it feels good. I’d be lying if I said that I don’t crave for that occasional smoke while drinking but I can control that urge, look the other way and not go out with the others as they head out for a smoke and not give in to temptation. I feel a teeny meeny bit proud of myself cos this was of my own accord and no external influence. Yeayyyyyyyy! I wonder if Dad would have been proud of me. I wonder if this was his doing. I don’t know and I never will know but maybe in some strange way his passing away did induce me to quit smoking. The biggest kick is being able to run on the tread mill for 7 minutes continuously at the speed of 8kms an hour or being able to run 3 minutes at the breakneck speed of 11 kms an hour while your fellow joggers reduce their speed after the first minute too tired to carry on at that speed. By the end of those final minutes that familiar excruciating pain in my chest doesn’t hound me any longer and I am not choking or gasping for breath like I use to but just panting, plain panting and breathing, breathing freely and gulping in more oxygen. Yeayyyy baby its quite the high not smoking at all.

“The best way to stop smoking is to just stop - no ifs, ands or butts.”