New Year’s Day
New Year’s Day, 2010.
It was still dark when the act of coughing up sludge awoke me. Shit, I thought. No cough syrup available because of the alcohol content. No soothing Benadryl or Tylenol PM to rock me gently to sleep despite the lung ratting. We couldn’t even take allergy medicine with antihistamines, which would cause a dirty result if the director decided to randomly drug test us.
Thankfully I had the room to myself. I’d have hated to wake up a roommate before 8 AM on one of the only days off we got here.
I kept hacking, regretting the cigar I smoked last night to ring in the New Year. I should have gone with the Pax 2 Vapes at 180Smoke.ca, which I had loked up a week back. Though I’m not a smoker, I needed something to help me celebrate. With no bottle of champagne to myself, my usual New Year’s tradition, I felt skittish all day. I talked too fast during our break, and when Delia offered to pick me up something for tonight, I asked her for a cigar. One of the flavored ones, preferably grape.
Fraternizing with the opposite sex was usually forbidden, but on New Year’s Eve the rules loosened a bit, and we all stuck in nervous clumps on the cafeteria patio. It looked like a junior high school dance at first, but we gradually crossed demarcation lines.
As I lit up my cough syrup-flavored cigar with Delia on the patio, a group of the men buzzed around her like a swarm of bees. She had that kind of effortless magnetism, a personality that made you feel as if you were better than you were.
Terry, one of the men who worked on kitchen duty, pointedly asked me as I took a deep breath of the cigar, “Wait, you don’t smoke, right?” He looked surprised at the cloud of smoke around my head like a dirty halo.
“No. I’m just celebrating the New Year,” I said. Though I felt a little light headed, this wasn’t what I wanted. I took another deep inhale.
“Are you inhaling?” Jim asked me, raising his eyebrow. I didn’t even know these guys knew who I was. So far, I had tried to make myself invisible here.
“Yes. Why?”
“Wow, that’s hardcore,” he said, shaking his head and chuckling a little. What was he talking about? Hardcore? I thought the point of smoking was to inhale.
“I’m a hardcore person,” I told him, which was a lie. Sort of. I wasn’t really sure what kind of person I was.
Now, in the wee hours of the morning, I was paying for that uncertainty. As I spit out some of the crap I coughed up into a tissue, wheezing and feeling my lungs contract in familiar pain, I understood why inhaling a cigar is a bad idea. It probably didn’t help that I had recovered from a severe case of pneumonia the month prior. I am so stupid, I thought.
I threw the tissue on the nightstand, then also realized that I wasn’t drunk. Last New Year’s began the time of life when I didn’t stop drinking, no matter the time of day.
I am coherent, I thought, and I’m coughing up shit. So far, this is a very different New Year’s.
– – –
Back from blogging hiatus to be with my favorite peeps at yeah write.
42 Comments
Chris plumb
Mmm…nothing says Happy Holidays like smoky grape flem wrapped in a tissue. Hope this Year was a bit more festive. Good to see you back on the radar.
Chris plumb recently posted…Start an Affirmation Day Tradition to Celebrate Those Closest To You.
Natalie DeYoung
I know, recipe for holiday fun. This New Year was BOMB compared to that one.
Beduwen
Happy New Year Natalie! I also celebrate very differently these days…surrounded by kids and step kids at home instead of out with drunk, crazy people. “Celebrating” can take on many forms, and it doesn’t have to include alcohol to be fun. Just having (or doing) something special that you don’t treat yourself to very often can bring it up a notch so you don’t obsess on the missing drinks.
All the best to you in 2014!
Beduwen recently posted…7 Tips to Survive the Call To Change
Natalie DeYoung
Exactly! I learned to have other kinds of fun over the years…
Michelle Longo
Those grape cigars are awful. My husband and friend smoked those on NYE. Ew.
Happy New Year. Hope this year has significantly less hacking 🙂
Michelle Longo recently posted…The Urge to Purge.
Natalie DeYoung
Yes, so far, less grape-flavored coughing this New Year’s. 🙂
Ben Jackson
I didn’t even know they MADE grape flavored cigars!
Holidays always seem to highlight the big life changes we’ve made – good on you for getting through!
Ben Jackson recently posted…Counting Down
Natalie DeYoung
Oh yeah. Go out and buy yourself one of those bad boys; you will be sure to regret it.
chamanasgar
Happy New Year Natalie. I hope you’re feeling better.
Natalie DeYoung
Thank you, much. 🙂
Vanessa D.
This year, New Year’s Eve was different without The Polish Guy. I poured a drink but only took a few sips before heading off to bed. When I was with The Polish Guy, all of our time together revolved around drinking. Without him, I’m back to being me and only occasionally drinking and then in moderation. I no longer regret his absence from my life.
PS I used to love those flavored cigars!
Vanessa D. recently posted…Want to be a stripper? Don’t worry! Canada’s government is looking out for you.
Natalie DeYoung
Good plan: moderation. 😉
Kate
I bet you feel better in the morning though 🙂 I imagine its tough this time of year. Happy New Year.
Kate recently posted…This year I resolve to be better
Natalie DeYoung
MUCH better. 😉 Thank you!
Stacie
Grape cigars? That probably still wouldn’t have made it palatable for me! I’m glad this, although better than prior years, was a few years ago. I hope ringing in 2014 was awesome!
Natalie DeYoung
It was vile, let me tell you. 2014 was amazing, especially comparatively speaking.
Joe
I’m gagging just thinking about you coughing.
Joe recently posted…A New Year’s Day Surprise
Natalie DeYoung
Pretty nasty!
Considerer
Grape. Flavoured. Cigar.
WTactualF?!?!
I think you earned the phlegm! Glad this year was better for you. And hey, there’s always the old adage that pain lets us know we’re still alive…
Considerer recently posted…The Acorn Resolution
Natalie DeYoung
Oh yeah. It was nasty. And true – I have never felt more alive than I do now. 🙂
Lance
weird, first time I ever smoked a cigar was new years eve…I was thirteen
Hope you feel better. I love your writing style. I always feel engaged and as if I’m in the story with you.
Happy Catorce, Natalie…can’t wait for lefty pop
Lance recently posted…One Piece At A Time
Natalie DeYoung
Thirteen! Wow. I was twenty seven…
Thank you, Lance! Here’s to a great year and a great new website. 🙂
Ellen
Grape cigars? The things I don’t know…
Congratulations on making it through that New Year’s Day and all the ones since!
Ellen recently posted…Bicycle
Natalie DeYoung
Oh, you aren’t missing much… 😉
And thank you.
Samantha Brinn Merel
Happy new year! I missed your voice in these parts 🙂
Samantha Brinn Merel recently posted…New Years Day 2014
Natalie DeYoung
Thanks! I’ve missed being around. 🙂
lisa thomson
Happy New Year Natalie! May 2014 bring you exciting things and much joy (and less flem) 🙂
lisa thomson recently posted…Looking Forward 2014
Natalie DeYoung
Yes! Less phlegm is a good thing.
Ilene
I had no idea about flavored cigars. That must have been an odd New Year’s – the first without alcohol. I think the first time we break habit or tradition over anything feels strange…until it feels normal. I hope your cough didn’t last long.
Ilene recently posted…A Modern Family Christmas
Natalie DeYoung
Oh yeah, totally weird. It felt alternately sad and happy – sad because I wanted to drink, but happy because it felt like I had a new chance at life.
And no, it was gone within a week. 😉
Sarah | LeftBrainBuddha
Great to celebrate new beginnings when you can see how far you’ve come. Happy New Year!
Sarah | LeftBrainBuddha recently posted…My Word of the Year. {And Why I Totally Think It Should Be “Frog.” Seriously.}
Christine Organ
Now THAT is a NYE to remember! Wishing you all the best in 2014 – including the absence of post-celebration phlegm 🙂
Christine Organ recently posted…On Building Bridges
Natalie DeYoung
Haha, no phlegm in sight! Thank you.
Eli@coachdaddy
We should invent cigars with cough drops ground into them, with expectorant, so that you can begin to treat your lungs for the smoke the instant you inhale.
either that, or bacon-flavored cigars, if it’s any easier.
Eli@coachdaddy recently posted…Ask Away Friday with NJ of A Cookie Before Dinner
Natalie DeYoung
Dual purpose! Or bacon, yeah.
Ericamos
I love the way you wrote this! I felt like I was there with you in a smokey, grape haze. (And for the record, I totally would have inhaled too…who knew?!)
Ericamos recently posted…Now Presenting, Mrs. Brown
Natalie DeYoung
I certainly didn’t know! Thanks, Erica!
Ponty
Hello Natalie, pleased to learn you’ve great time enjoying New Year 2014. This New Year celebration was quite different enjoyment for me as well. Went to an island and meet up with new peoples and a mixed enjoyment taste I’ve had tasted though. Anyway love the way you shared your feelings!!
Ponty recently posted…Which is better alcohol or hydrogen peroxide?
Stephanie @ Mommy, for Real.
I felt like I was reading a chapter of a novel. I want more! 🙂 I love the glimpses you so generously give your readers into your life experiences.
Stephanie @ Mommy, for Real. recently posted…Aiming for Mediocrity: Why I’ll Settle for a Good Enough 2014
Natalie DeYoung
Wow, thanks!
Erica O
Because I am a really mean person, I laughed at you in my head when I read you were sucking the smoke into your lungs. And then I realized that not everyone gets taught how to smoke a cigar when they turn 12.
So, just in case you haven’t figured it out yet and are again called upon to smoke another cigar (hopefully one that is not fruit-flavored. Fruit wood, maybe, but not a flavor that can also be found in bubblegum) – cigar smoke is to taste. You just let it sit in your mouth, swish it around, blow it out and taste it. That’s all you gotta do. It’s not for putting in your lungs; it’s not a cigarette.
And also, I am still giggling in my head a bit. Poor you, with your lungs full of chemical-grape cigar smoke!
Erica O recently posted…To find holiday joy
Natalie DeYoung
Oh, you’re not being mean – it was funny! I’ve since learned, and while I’ll never smoke my own cigar again, I’ve taken a puff here and there of Mike’s cigars with NO inhaling, lol. And no nasty flavoring.