My brother is the complete opposite of me in every way. He's tall, while I'm short. He has the best posture of anyone I know, while I struggle to "sit up straight." He's way good at math, while I chose my college, largely based on the fact that I wouldn't have to take math ever (which was highlighted in my college tour. Science 101 however, was a requirement...can't win em all...). He's great with saving and budgeting money, and I'm great at spending it. He's the most OCD person I know, and I well...they don't really have a cool acronym for what I am. He went into Finance. I went into Graphic Design. He shops at Brooks Brothers. I shop everywhere. His closet looks like a display in the Container Store catalogue. Each hanger is a finger width apart. My closet looks like the before photo in a Clean Sweep episode (not in a gross way,...it's just...eclectic?). And last, (but only for the purposes of this blog, I could go on for days on our differences) he's a non-smoker and I'm an ex-smoker.
I bring this up because last night was his "not- with-family" birthday party. You know, it's the party where you go out with a ridiculous amount of people, and see things you wish you could remember the next day? Well, I remember everything including having to sneak in a childhood friend because he wasn't dressed "appropriately" (whatever that means), which worked...but this is the one time so far that I can think of since I quit smoking, where NOT having a cigarette probably worked to my advantage because had I been smoking I would have felt super human. I would have probably copped an attitude, created a scene and said something I'd never regret later. Instead I stood there, trying not to stare at the group of guys complaining that "they need some hoes in their life" while chain smoking next to us. Not gonna lie,...I did take a few very deep breaths...
By the end of the evening, I was exhausted. I don't really go to clubs normally. I'm more a bar person...I like to hear my friends when they talk, I like not getting bumped into by big girls with paw prints tattooed on their cleavage (even if I could have totally taken her). I like not having to be grabbed onto a dance floor by a random stranger who smelled like shoe polish. I like having a few beers...not a few miscellaneous shots that were chosen for me, and I like that at a bar, there are just as many people outside the bar smoking as there are inside wishing they could smoke and one of the things I miss about smoking is the situational ability to talk to someone you don't know because you both smoke, without the small talk. I know...hard to envision, but completely possible. Like this:
Random Smoker: Hey do you have a light?
Me: Yeah sure...one sec.
Random Smoker: No worries, I should have taken some matches from the bowl.
Me: Matches? No. You shouldn't have.
Random Smoker: Yeah...matches are kinda lame. So none of your friends smoke?
Me: (flicking bic) Not really... something about,...it's bad for you?
Random Smoker: You know....you shouldn't believe everything you hear.
Me: I don't. Nice meeting you and stay off the matches!
Of course this is an abbreviated conversation of a real one I had last year with a guy that looked like he could be on Jersey Shore but it was nevertheless interesting. Last night however, again, was probably a perfect time for me not to be smoking. I would have been the awkward one in the group, feeling increasingly inadequate at my lack of ability to contribute to the conversation at hand. The topic being "needing hoes in ones life" and all... I would have had to have dug deep for that one...or not because I really don't think I need hoes in my life, or cigarettes for that matter.
PS: I know the run on sentences in this one are marathon in length but did I mention I did go to a club last night?
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