Coping mechanisms

A couple of months ago, I found out some interesting news: Marinara Jar is engaged. I always wondered what it would feel like to hear that news. We broke up nearly three years ago, and believe me I do not regret that one iota, but I have been curious about how I would respond tin that moment? Turns out, it made me want to smoke.

For those of you that don't know me, I'm not a smoker. I've maybe had a handful of cigarettes in my lifetime (almost all of them regrettable college choices, well, and a few times coincidentally with Marinara Jar himself, ahem, choices I do regret). And I didn't really want a cigarette when I heard the news, what I wanted was to be a smoker so that I could go outside, stick a cigarette between my fingers, aggressively put it to my lips, suck in as hard as I can, pull it away, hold my breath for a second, shake my head and exclaim, "what the what?!" Because that's what the moment was calling for. Do you know what I'm talking about?

I know it's a weird response, but it's honestly what I wanted. And even just going through the motions, sans cigarette, it made me feel better. I didn't need to go out and be a smoker, I just needed to pretend I was one. There was something about the kinetic energy of that scenario that was strangely calming. Well, kinetic energy, or my overactive imagination. It makes me think back to when I was a kindergartner over at a friend's house and she asked me if I wanted some Kool-Aid. My response? No, because all I had to do was think of a flavor, say grape, and swallow the spit in my mouth and voila, grape Kool-Aid. Yes. Yes I did actually think that. And yes, yes I did actually just tell the Internets that.

Actually, it's not really like pretend Kool-Aid at all; I think it's more like the catch phrase on my JV basketball sweatshirt circa 1992: the body achieves what the mind believes. Only I think when we came up with that saying, we weren't talking about fake smoking to help deal with the reality that your ex-boyfriend is getting married.