I smell like cigar smoke. I don't normally smoke cigars, but I was invited to go over to hang out with a few guys from work tonight. I used to chew tobacco for a long time. I started when I was 15 years-old and while I hated it the first few times (sweating, throwing up), I was hooked pretty quickly. I guess it's like any habit, after dipping every day for a couple of weeks, I found myself craving one at certain times of the day. I'd do a dip before school, after school, and a few more times after dinner.
As I got older, I found other occasions where a dip became part of my routine. Driving in the car, while I was drinking, during ROTC outings, when I was writing. In college, my habit grew to a tin a day. That was when it cost about $1 or so for a tin of Kodiak. I found myself running out a lot at night. I would walk over to the 24 hour "L" stop, and hope they were selling "A" tins.
I'm not sure if Kodiak is still like this, but they had a system where the freshest tins seemed to have a serial number that started with an "A". They had A cans, B cans, C cans and D cans. D were the worst, but if that was all the store had, I'd get it and suffer through the under-par taste.
I used to have a spit bowl that I would use throughout the day. I never emptied it. I could go a couple of weeks before it really needed to be dumped out. It was pretty sick.
I also used to dip a lot with Bob Porter. We dipped in college together when we studied, we dipped after a run. We went through a bunch of tins when we drive across the country from Chicago to Las Vegas and back one Thanksgiving holiday. When he moved away to Baltimore, whenever he came home for a visit, one of the first things we did was crack open a new tin and share a dip on the way home from the airport.
I even went so far as to suggest that his then girlfriend, Lisa, engage in the same tradition one year when she came to visit us for a long weekend during Bob's trip away to Officer Candidate School. I picked up Lisa at the airport and she was very pleased to partake in the tradition when I suggested it. I quickly realized my mistake when not two minutes after Lisa put the dip in her mouth, she was sweating profusely and vomiting in the empty coffee cup I gave her that was originally supposed to be used for spit. Little did I know that she had never had any form of tobacco in her system. Ever. She was sick the rest of the night. Not a great way to start a fun vacation to Chicago or to integrate my best friend's girlfriend into our lives.
There were times when I would quit chewing. I'd feel a shift in my jaw and vow to stop forever. But that never lasted. The taste would be unbearable and I would vow to quit forever. Didn't work. I used it as a crutch, at times, when I was stressed, and used it as a stress reliever.
Sometimes the mantra is "you'll quit when you are really ready." That happened to me a little over three years ago.
Bob and Lisa were married in October 2005. Cyndi and the kids and I drove to Maryland for the wedding. We designed a family road trip around the event, and so, of course I bought a tin for the tip.
On the way back, about 30 minutes from home, I put in a dip. We had traveled that night from Cincinnati, after hanging out with my godfather during the day. We were nearing the end of a long 10 day road-trip and I simply wanted to get home. About ten minutes after putting the dip in, I started to get queasy. Seriously sick. So sick that I had to pull over. It freaked me out. I had never experienced this kind of feeling before. The only thing that kept running through my head was that it had to be the tobacco. Right or wrong, that's what my head deduced.
I pulled the dip out of my mouth, threw it into the street, and have not had a craving for one ever since.
I guess I was ready.
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