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Wow, it's been 370 days since I touched this. Let me try to recap the year... Same old shit, same old shit, same old shit, started smoking again, same old shit, same old shit, same old shit, and now here I am.

Any potentially interesting details are waaaaay to personal for me to feel comfortable sharing.

Right now I'm as close to panic as I think I've ever been, I'm quitting smoking for good this time on Friday, my labor day weekend is going to suck, and it's scaring me. If you don't understand addiction, let me try to explain it.

When you get chemically addicted to a substance, your brain quits producing the natural compounds that it's getting artificially. Nicotine is one of the most addictive substances humans fuck around with, and it's so addictive because it matches up to not just one neuroreceptor, but a whole mess of 'em. The biggest problem ones are the feel good and feel bad juices, and the muscle control juices. Ever heard someone complain about being shaky or trembling? Were they a smoker? I know that right after I smoke, I get twitchy and if I hold up a piece of paper it's impossible to read because my hand shakes so much. Thanks nicotine.

When you quit introducing a chemical that your body has grown dependent on, it takes about three weeks for your body to start producing the natural variants in significant enough quantities that you can actually tell something is going on upstairs. And I've left out explaining the associative and habitual aspects of the smoking addiction. Those are obnoxious, but it can be easy to replace the motion of smoking with candy suckers, or training yourself to watch people or listen to music instead of smoking while you're writing. I'm so afraid of this quit, because the first time I did, for whatever reason my brain didn't start spitting out the hormones it needed all at once, it turned on one or two at a time, and the first ones to come back online were not euphoric, happy juices. It was scary, there were times where I was content, watching TV with my roommate's dog, and inexplicably this huge wave of sorrow would just crash and break all over me. One time I had to go to my room and cry for about half an hour, I was just so broken up, and over nothing at all. I've always attacked problems, confronted issues, sought resolution. Knowing I'm probably going to go up against feelings that have no basis, no connection to anything scares me horribly.

That's my thoughts on addiction. In other news, this week I've started taking steps (albeit small, tiny, probably backwards steps) to get my life on track. A friend casually said something in the middle of a conversation that has just been tearing me up, pushing me to get off my ass. I know doing the things I want to do is going to be difficult without at least a framed BA sitting in my pile of worldly belongings, but I'm not afraid to try. Who knows, maybe once I start getting my feet moving in the right direction, I'll find a way to finish up college. Right now my biggest goal is to get active in my community again, I'm researching local non-profits and trying to decide who and how I want to give my time to.

Since it could be another year before I write here, I hope you all are well and will be well until we talk again!