Kicking It with a New Year

It’s probably a bad idea to make another New Year’s resolution since I’ve only kept one in my entire life. I admit to being weak. But I did keep one. Really?

Yes, once. The year I stopped smoking.

For years I resolved to quit. But quitting was easy. I musta quit a dozen times. Every smoker knows you only stop once.

It’s hell because it takes at least a year to recover from the nicotine habit. First the brain would trigger a need for a hit. Not much different from the plant in “Little Shop of Horrors,” when Audrey says, “Feed me. Feed me.”

My auto-reflex kicked on as I flipped the lid up on the box of Virginia Slims. It took just a pinch between the thumb and forefinger to extract a long skinny smoke, followed by a Dunhill spark as I simultaneously slipped the tobacco between my lips and captured the flame with a deep inhale. As a rule, my addiction recurred every 45 minutes for over 30 years.

Which is why I can never light up again. Two reasons actually. One: eventually I’d have to stop again because hospitals no longer allow smoking. Two: all my smoker-friends are dead.

Back in the day, smokers ruled. We were empowered by our right to smoke. Go figure? Now smokers are the loneliest people in the world. Although the last time we were in Paris, Café Society still congregated with their fags on the sidewalks.

And of course, all of us rehabilitated Exes look down upon those lacking our strength of character and will power. That said, to this day, I will still swain close to anyone puffing a name brand ciggie just to inhale the raw smoke as I saunter by. Gawd, I loved smoking in my size four jeans.

One wonders why Big Tobacco hasn’t been called out. Meanwhile, all of my other New Year’s resolutions didn’t really amount too much. Like ‘I’ll give up chocolate.’ Really? That’s good for about a week or until I pass near a See’s Candy kitchen.

Here is the thing. With each passing year, I get clumsier and more absentminded. And if you are of a certain age, you know what I’m talking about.

Most of my mornings go like this. I’ll have my cell phone in one hand and half a cup of cold coffee in the other trekking toward the kitchen for a refill. But what happens is I spot last night’s TV-watching blanket still on my sofa waiting to be folded. Naturally, I veer over, fold it, stuff it on its shelf.

Meanwhile, my original mission to get a refill is obliterated by the simple act of blanket folding. As it happens, I then swing into the kitchen, grab a bite of fruit, make a piece of toast, and shuffle back down the hall to my desk.

At 8:30, my cell phone alarm goes off reminding me to take my morning meds. I head to my bathroom, swallow the meds, and start the morning game of “find the phone.” The phone alarm will only ring out for a few minutes before it goes silent. And that is when my daily Easter egg hunt begins.

Which leads me to this year’s New Year’s resolution. I need a new habit. This particular dilemma mirrors another situation, ‘Where are my car keys?’ I finally

found a solution. They go in the hall table drawer. Period. Which is why that particular hunt is at an end.

Now as for the cell phone, it’s an entirely different matter. That puppy just seems to vanish.

That is why in 2025 the Year of the Snake, my New Year’s resolution is: “I resolve to place my cell phone in the remote-control platter under the television.”

Wish me luck, hopefully before your call is dumped into voice mail.

Elizabeth can be reached at [email protected].