People ask me why I smoke.
Well, I picked up smoking because I was betrayed. Up until the age of 18, I had no idea what it meant to have your trust broken and your belief in another human shattered. Sure, I had faced disappointments before but losing out in a track and field meet or finding out that your Dad’s sister hated your guts for no apparent reason was not quite the same as being betrayed for the first time.
I had just returned from holiday in Europe after about a month. My then boyfriend had gone on holiday prior to my departure. He returned home after I had left my hols so altogether, we hadn’t seen each other for close to two months. Ten years ago, at 18, we couldn’t afford cellphones. Pagers were the in-thing at the time and neither of us had the luxury of having a laptop with remote access to the Internet to email each other either. If memory serves correct, I was still using a 56kbps dial-up at home on my first desktop. Either way, over those 2 months, contact and conversations between us were very few and far between.
When I returned home after my holiday, I shortly found out that the then boyfriend had cheated on me during my absence. Worst of all, I knew the girl too. We were mutual friends and all studying in the same faculty. My heart broke. My trust for him and our relationship no longer existed and for the first time in my life, I understood the meaning of the word betrayal. If you ask me why it was such a big deal well, quite simply, he was the first guy I ever fell in love with. I knew not of such emotion, feeling or happiness until we got together and he took all of that away with one impulsive decision.
The next few weeks following the revelation were intense. I didn’t eat. I subsisted on Vitasoy (for my foreign readers, Vitasoy is a soya bean based drink) and nothing much else. Then one day, for some reason I felt compelled to do something damaging. So I went to the nearest store, bought my first pack of cigarettes, a lighter and went down the street, lighting my very first cigarette, taking my first few drags, thinking that I would never trust another human with my heart ever again.
That tumultuous relationship lasted a lot longer afterwards. Over the course of 3 years, he cheated on me a total of 3 times, with 3 different girls. Yes, I was stupid, naïve and most tellingly, desperate enough to stick with him throughout all of that. Like they say, third time lucky eh?
Ten years on, I still smoke. I’m not a hardcore smoker by a mile but I haven’t made a conscious effort to try and quit either. Though I have forgiven my then boyfriend for whatever has happened in the past, my cigarettes remind me of how easy it is to have your emotions trampled on and flung out the window like confetti. Even when I was with D - probably the only other man whom I have ever had any real feelings for - I never felt any compulsion to give up smoking. Somehow, over the years, with my constantly growing and renewed cynicism, perhaps the only thing that has remained constant is the fact that I have no qualms about reaching for my cigarettes and lighting up.
I am in no way an advocate of the habit and I just want to make it clear that my decision to not kick the habit is purely a personal one. I can go without cigarettes for days but I have come to realise that my desire to step out and light up is usually fuelled by some sort of emotional or mental distress – work, friends, family, personal life etc. And because until today, I cannot forget the feeling of betrayal.
And that is why I smoke.
P.S. On the subject of D, I went home last night to discover that he had sent over an entire box of my personal belongings that I had left behind in his apartment, many, many, many months (we’re talking a year +++ here), ago when we split up. Frankly I had given up all hope on ever seeing those things again. Anyway, they have been returned after all this time, and I do not know the motivation behind the action because we are not on speaking terms. I am inclined to think that perhaps he has a new partner that he has asked to move in with him, or maybe he’s just finally decided to move on. Whatever the case, I hope he is well and I wish him nothing but joy and happiness in the future.
