My vacation takeaways

I like pinpointing the peak of an experience — sometimes during, sometimes afterward. Any experience can have a peak — eating a sandwich, a day at work, a weekend away. Whatever.

A couple of weeks ago I took my first true solo vacation. I hit the road by myself and drove a total of about 1,800 miles. I wasn’t sure I’d have much fun without a traveling companion but honestly, it was great and I did have lots of fun. My trip involved revisiting a familiar place — the Great Smokey Mountains National Park, including Cades Cove and Townsend, TN. I also picked a couple of new places to visit — Beaufort, SC and Savannah, GA. Both new places were towns I’d heard nice things about. A few years ago, my scattered family and I had talked about meeting up in Savannah for a vacation but that trip never materialized. But I’d researched Savannah online and it sounded really cool.

Four Months of Not Smoking

I’ve now hit the four-month non-smoking mark. I am astounded. It has been far easier than I ever imagined. The only bumps in the road have been intense cravings for chocolate and sweets and my extreme irritability. I thought I’d be a sleepy, ditzy, non-smoking shrew and that hasn’t happened yet. Well, at least not the sleepy and ditzy parts.

One Approach to Quitting Smoking

The most basic key to successfully giving up cigarettes is to quit with a plan and with a good reason. Trying to quit because a loved one wants you or because you’re flying to Europe and will have to endure several hours of not smoking is just not good enough. It’s trite but true: you have to want to quit. And having a plan is essential so you’re prepared when you come across those inevitable bumps in the road. Don’t give yourself an out for failure. There are no valid excuses for giving up on quitting. Life being what it is, there will never be the perfect time to quit. Shit happens and you have to be prepared to deal with it without cigarettes.

How I Quit Smoking

On January 2, I quit smoking at 7:30 in the morning. As a smoker of 32 years, quitting has been a thousand times easier than I ever imagined it would be. And the reason it’s been so easy is Chantix (Varenicline) — the prescription drug from Pfizer. I started taking the pills a week before my target quit date, as directed. Some time around the fifth day, smoking a cigarette was becoming an odd experience. The smoke had somehow gotten “neutralized” and I was not getting the satisfaction from a smoke like I used to. On top of that, the smoke itself tasted funny — not bad but not good, either. What was going on? Well, apparently, it was the Chantix at work.

Smoking or chain-smoking?

You know how they say smoking kills? And how every cigarette pack comes with a dire FDA warning about lung cancer or some other morbid health topic smokers don’t want to know about ? And how it’s been common knowledge for years that smoking shortens your life expectancy? And how smokers can no longer smoke in most indoor places and even many outdoor ones? And how the price of a pack of cigarettes has gotten insanely high in recent years? And how badly a person who just stepped out to smoke stinks when they come back inside? And how smokers are now the worst of society’s pariahs? So what kind of idiot would continue to smoke in this day and age? Me, until 78 days ago. And frankly, I quit for the shallowest of reasons.