I wasn't advocating smoking by any means, especially being an ex smoker. I find the second hand smoke offensive, and it is an irritant when I ride up to a stop light/sign and there someone sits in their vehicle smoking and their smoke wafts my way.

But, I am not going to be an ex smoker like the exsmoking nazis I've met, the ones who'll get upset the a cigarette was lit on the next block. There is nonsense and reality. Reality is people smoke. Some are able to quit.

I was able to quit successfully through nicotine gum. I also spent a lot of time in a smoky coffee house inhaling second hand smoke. It got me through some of the rough withdrawl.

And just a note about the addictive personality, being a member of the "recovering" community. A lot of us do take responsibility for what we did while using. We are far from perfect, and some of us owe society a large debt for the damage we did, not just to ourselves. It is often a lot larger than we can pay back. I hope that in my continuing to not do the things I did when I was actively using and finding ways and means to use more, I am in some way making amends.

Today I hold a job; in the recovery field, where I can share with other, younger (in recovery) people how I do it. I pay taxes, rent and other bills. I am a part of society today. It isn't always comfortable, even after 15 years I still want to do things that not only aren't healthy, but slightly illegal as well. I have to take responsibility for those actions.

We all make excuses. I think as human beings it is just our nature. I look at my brother and myself, three years seperate us. He's married, two kids and outweighs me by 100 lbs. He eats(his kids joke that my brother's favorite food group is "itos." As in Doritos, Fritos, Cheetoes.), I smoked, drank and drugged. We both are/were killing ourselves. I have another brother who instead of picking up a drug or food, has picked up the Bible(not to open a can of worms), but this has been a way of alienating himself from us, as much as the drugs were for me, and food is for my brother. There are those of us who aren't capable of managing or mantain a life at status quo. I have worked with them for just about eleven years now. We used to warehouse them in big institutions, we didn't help them, now we are trying something different. I don't have an answer for them, I just am trying like hell not to become one of them.

I think one of the big lessons we are here to learn is to make mistakes, just not the same ones over and over.

Just my .02.