Flick goes the lighter. And the fire burns the tip of a new cigarette. Inhale. Exhale. And I think to myself how impossible it is to explain this feeling gripping me - gripped me from my first cigarette ever, at twenty-one. Perhaps it's not a feeling at all, but instead a demon that took hold of me one day when I wasn't looking, perhaps when I was listlessly crossing from one side of the street to the other. Nevertheless, feeling or demon, something has definitely exacted a toll on my soul.

Perhaps it's anger. Perhaps it's more than that. A simple word like anger cannot describe the sensation of my entire body being pressed inward by an unbearable force of some kind. Something is making my skin crawl. Something is making my fists permanently clinched. Something is trying to suffocate me - trying to ring me dry of any faith I have left in God, any hope I have for love, any spark I have left to live. Yes, I am sure that I am angry. But it seems directed at no one... and at nothing. For absolutely no reason at all, I feel angry - a general anger - an overwhelming discomfort - a compulsion to punch a hole in my wall if it would not cost me half of my "security deposit", if it would not consume three days worth of wages.

Inhale. Exhale. I need a vacation so badly. It has been years since I've taken one. But not from this town or its people... but from my own body. I need to escape my own view of myself - escape all I've experienced - all I've learned... I want to run away from my ever-present feeling of having been abandoned and forgotten by the ghost that I will one day become - from the feeling of having been gypped by God. I need a break from looking into the mirror, second guessing every contour of my face, every feature of my body, every placement of every hair - wondering what people see when they look at me - asking myself, is this person remotely likable? Am I attractive? Would cosmetic surgery increase my stock value? Do I wield a sense of humor only to compensate for the lack of attention God put in to creating me? Inhale. Exhale. Why am I alone and without a passion for another human being on a Saturday night? I would SMASH the mirror if it would not come directly out of my measly paycheck, if it would not force me to loose my phone service for a month.


A new cigarette. Flick goes the lighter. Inhale. BIG exhale. And a new realization dawns on me. I have not sighed in a long time. Or perhaps I have but I've missed each and every one. Perhaps my sighs have made no lasting impression because my mind lately has been on other things - the past, the present... any future at all. Any. Or perhaps the truth is I am just not able to sigh deep enough anymore. Perhaps at thirty-three, I am already too weathered to form a sigh deep enough to cut through this crippling tension, this perpetual anxiety and give me some relief. Of course it could be the cigarettes that are making it seem like there is less oxygen in the world than there was ten years ago, but I doubt it. Yet, if it is... fuck it. Inhale. Exhale.

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