The Drifting Stink

Sitting at the computer tonight with the windows open I found myself sniffing at an unpleasant smell. Within a few seconds I realized somebody was walking by the house smoking a cigarette.

Now, I still smoke an occasional cigar - probably numbering about one or two a month, if that many - but my cigarette smoking came to an end on New Years Day 1999.

I don't know if it's somehow part of being a former smoker or if people who've never smoked their entire lives even notice but when I smell cigarettes now, it is absolutely revolting. I know it will sound like hyperbole but it stinks like a combination of runny cat shit, rotten toothed bad breath and caked-on body odor.

I also know this reads like yet another condemnation of cigarette smoking but as I have already attempted to infer - I still enjoy the smell of cigars and I don't understand how that works.

How did I ever actively burn down a whole Camel Light into my lungs if the stench was this horrible the first time I merely smelled it? Again, this is not some unsponsored Public Service Announcement out to further bust the balls of hopeless drug addicts who will smoke to the very day they die...

I am not attempting to take a moral position on cigarettes here, I genuinely do not understand what has triggered such a visceral repulsion in me towards something I once desired. Is this what you call a learned behavior? Addiction is not fad or fickle. How does someone get so far beyond it like I have?