Another 'middling' day - a look at the beginning

Happy Wednesday! Here we are again. 5 cigarettes so far today, planning 1 more tonight, then tomorrow is the LAST DAY!!! Craziness. I'm of mixed feelings about the whole thing, but here we are... here we are... In honor of this, and the fact that I just haven't talked about it yet, I thought I would go a bit into WHY I initially started smoking.

When I was 19, and a freshman in college, I was in a play called "The Great Frozen Man". In this play I was cast as a young teen who was bucking authority and, when his mother loses it because his grandfather goes into a coma, starts to smoke and have trouble in school.

It was a lot of fun. It was an original play, and I was eager to do everything that I could to make the part all that it could have been. When I was reading the play the first time, I remember thinking - okay - I'm going to have to smoke during this. I had seen the fake cigarettes used on stage with kids or teens when they were playing parts that "required" smoking, and I did not like them. I did not think it looked real, so I went and bought a pack.

Camel Menthols. I thought - yeah, those look good. And they're supposed to be minty.

Whoa - I was wrong. They were gross! (and I mean, more gross than my non-menthol cigarettes... or something like that).

I spent a few days working on them, trying them out. At that time I was living with my parents, so I was trying them late at night or while I was at school, hoping that nobody would smell them on me. But it just drove me crazy.

Then, a friend saw my cigarettes and wretched, then offered me a Marlboro Ultra Light. At that point, I switched over, smoking 1-2 cigarettes a day, hoping that it would get me to a point where I stopped getting light-headed and not feel like I was going to pass out.

The Director and other folks in the cast told me often that I did NOT need to start smoking for the show. And I felt the same way... but I also felt that I really needed to know what it was... I wanted to be the most incredible actor... and I did not think I could do it without smoking.

To be continued...