ATTENTION EVERYONE:

I am quitting smoking.

Yes...AGAIN.

The first thing that I always do when I quit smoking is to tell everyone I know. It's not so much for support--because the only one who can really help you to quit is YOU--but more like I'm hoping that I will be too ashamed to start smoking again, after telling everyone I have quit. Actually, I've been down this road before, too. Then I just start being a closeted smoker, and then one day I forget that it's supposed to be a secret and I light up all nonchalantly and someone says, "Didn't you quit?"

And then I laugh, "Oh come on...that was months ago!"

This time I think it will be different because it's not for a boy, it's not for my health, and it's not for financial constraints. It's for VANITY. My skin is looking quite terrible lately, and I don't want to have that ashen, wrinkly skin that smokers get after smoking half their lives. I've been smoking half my life. Yesterday I started obsessively massaging my face in class to try and get circulation in there. I'm also sick of listing myself as a smoker in my craigslist ads.

Okay, and there's a secondary reason. I think it's contributing to some feelings of inadequacy, which in turn compound themselves with self-destructive behavior. Sometimes, out of the blue, I think to myself that I'll never have children, because I smoke. Now we all know that this is fucked up because (a) I don't really want children to begin with, (b) many smokers have children, and (c) who the hell is messing with my head? But those thoughts are there. I think it also causes me to devalue my life subconsciously, and I don't really need help with that.

I do need help, though. Quitting always brings out the worst in me: the justification, the bending of self-imposed rules, the quitting quitting, telling myself that life is meaningless anyway, so why am I trying to prolong meaninglessness? There are an incredible amount of "resources" online to help you quit smoking. I used to be on QuitNet. Now it's kind of depressing because I get "quit anniversary" emails that say "Congratulations on having quit three years ago!" and what not. It also tells me I (could) have saved $6,000 by now. Gross.

I have a meeting with counselor on Wednesday. Let's see if I can make it until then.