I'm not a smoker. I'm not addicted to nicotine the way I am with caffeine and Starbuck's brownies. I smoke twice, maybe thrice a year, purely ceremonial really, to mark a highlight in my life like, say, surviving a flood that destroyed my precious book collection or finishing a Sylvia Plath novel without slashing my wrist.
Lately though, ever since giving birth, I've been smoking more often. It's growing on me. On days when I am overwhelmed by the roles I have to play (wife, lover, mother, teacher, daughter, sister, yaya trainor and part-time couch potato), I smoke. On days when I am consumed by guilt because 2 yayas, instead of 1 mommy, are taking care of my son, I smoke.
On days when trying to be just a decent mom is chocking me, I smoke.
Don't get me wrong. I love being a mom. Most of the time. There are low moments though. It cannot be helped. Like when I realized that the next time I will ever get a decent night's sleep is when my 10 month old turns twenty (Coz while still young, he'll be waking me up in the middle of the night. And when he becomes a teenager, he'll be waking me up in the middle of the night to let him in). Or when I watch, helplessly, fragments of my life-prior-to-having-a-kid floating far, far away from me. So long, size 2 denims! G'bye, pack-and-hit-the-road-in-just-a-moment's-notice-who-cares-where-our-feet-will-take-us-ladi-da-da urges! Yes, yes, time to light up a stick. Because when I puff--or more precisely, when I inhale killer fumes--my world turns dreamy and it's just me and my cigarette smoke in total embrace. Nothing else in between.
Smoking, I've read, kills brain cells. I think that's why I smoke. So I don't have to think so much. Even for just a few minutes.
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