Marlboro Memoir
Header by Maddy Baird
11 August 2020
Brand: Unknown
Intake: 1
Motivation: Maturity (Posing)
Another party was hosted at one of the houses in the Golden Briar complex. It was too small for a hundred-person party, and between all the vaping and dab pens, I needed to be outside. There were a few guys outside smoking cigs. I recognize one from my elementary school, but we don’t speak and to be honest, he’s not my kind of person. But he was drunk, saw me alone, and called me over. Although I’m not a fan, I was suddenly self-conscious about being alone at a party. I went over, he offered me a smoke, and it’s weird but I didn’t even hesitate. You would think that after all the health classes and CDC videos, I would be more opposed, but apparently not. I kept the smoke in my mouth because I was worried about inhaling it. I didn’t like it; it tasted dirty and smelled like my uncles did after coming back from “getting some air”. But I liked the way it made me look and the bizarre assurance it gave me. The people at these parties were older and more mature than I was used to, and this night’s crowd was especially so. The girls were drunkenly yelling at everyone, wearing tops that my mom would have burned, and the guys had aggression that I’d only seen in men who would yell stuff at me on the street. It had never occurred to me that those guys existed anywhere outside of storefronts and in their beat-up Subarus, but here they were. It was twisted, but I felt the need to prove myself grown enough to be at this party, whatever my puerile perception of maturity was.
26 January 2021
Brand: Marlboro
Intake: ½
Motivation: Romance (romanticizing)
I snuck out of the house to go for a drive with the boy I liked. It was in the middle of the pandemic, my parents were nervous, and I was selfish. We drove through Milton and stopped at the top of an escarpment to look at city lights. He told me that he came here a lot, on late-night drives after parties. I had never been in any kind of relationship up to this point and the whole thing seemed disgustingly perfect. He had a pack of Marlboros in his car, which was odd because I discovered later that he didn’t smoke. He offered me one, and even though I didn’t like the way it smelled or tasted, there was something so indie-romance-movie about smoking over a city view with a boy at four in the morning. We split the cigarette drag for drag. It’s funny because I had no idea what I was getting myself into, with the smoking and the boy. At the time, that night felt very temporary. I saw it as taking advantage of the moment. I actually never thought I was going to hang out with that boy again, given his reputation. At best, I figured I’d get some first experiences out of the way. But he ended up buying me my first pack months later, for my eighteenth birthday. Now, the smoking is ongoing and the boy became a habit I just recently shook. It seemed so inconsequential at the time.
23 March 2022
Brand: Marlboro
Intake: 1
Reason: Cold (and heartbroken, and bitter)
I was at a train station, on my way to Toronto. I smoked a cigarette on the platform because it was cold and I was feeling depressed. A couple with a young son stood some feet away from me, giving judgemental stares. Not that I cared– their son would likely grow up to get some girl hooked on Marlboros and also screw her up in the head for the rest of her life.
28 June 2022
Brand: Marlboro
Intake: 2
Reason: Drunk (on life)
I fell off the swing that hung from a giant tree in Aden’s father’s client’s old backyard. We stayed at prom for all of an hour and a half, before taking the cars to the after prom house. I had been drinking tequila all night and was surrounded by friends and guys I’d had a thing for throughout high school. A few of us needed air and went to the backyard, where I fell off a swing and didn’t have any desire to get up off the grass. I had two cigarettes behind my ear, so I lit them because I was never going to die. I laughed at Noah when he said that girls who smoke are unattractive because it was so ridiculous that anybody would care about that sort of thing. They went back inside shortly after. leaving me on the grass with my own company for maybe half an hour, so to be perfectly satisfied with my own company was a great feeling. My hair was spread out on the ground like a fan and the embers from my cigarette fell on it, but I was too drunk to think about a potential fire. Then my friends opened the sliding patio doors and called me back in, and my heart swelled with the kind of love that only comes from growing up together.
24 February 2023
Brand: Marlboro
Intake: 1
Reason: Genetics (?)
My mom used to smoke a lot in her twenties but she smoked her first cigarette when she was eight. We talked about it at a family dinner, two cocktails in. She and my aunt reminisced about the seventies when people would smoke in the house or in their station wagons. Then my dad said something mean to me because we’d been fighting all day about how I don’t respect myself. I was a little drunk and could not keep it together, so I excused myself and ran into a bathroom stall of Il Fornello where I cried and smoked a Marlboro Lite. My hands were trembling a bit, which was normal for me while holding a cigarette - I’m a pretty emotional smoker. It used to be a good thing, only smoking when I was drunk or sad, but then I went through a phase where I was sad a lot. An image of my mom’s smoking story came to my head, her at eight years old stashing cigarettes in a purple fluffy purse.
28 April 2023
Brand: Marlboro
Intake: 1
Reason: Birthday (I hate my birthday)
The Circle K on Sixth Line had been selling me cigarettes since I was seventeen. I had a fake ID from British Columbia and the clerks didn’t care enough to deny me. But I bought my first pack legally, with my Ontario license on my birthday. I had plans to go out with a girlfriend for drinks and dinner, but until then I was alone. So I bought a pack of Malboros and smoked one in my backyard. The sun was beaming and the grass smelled fresh. I took a long drag. It was the perfect gift to myself.
12 September 2023
Brand: Marlboro
Intake: 3
Reason: Loneliness (ish)
I moved into my first university house on September ninth. I had spent all day decorating my room to my liking and exchanging stories with my new roommates. It was a good first day by anyone’s standards, but it didn’t do anything to curb the wave of isolation I was hit with that night. I missed my family, my house, and my friends who knew me completely. My sleep schedule was messed up, so I was awake at three am, lonely and miserable. I sat on the curb outside of my new house and smoked for thirty minutes, just studying the houses across the street and making up life stories for the people who lived inside. I was on my second cigarette when this black cat wandered out of a driveway and onto the street in front of me. I’m not superstitious exactly, but I really didn’t need anything else to bum me out, so I ignored it. But then it wandered over to me, and I heard the little bell on its collar jingle, and I don’t know. This random cat suddenly made me feel much better about being alone. I guess it was because the cat seemed perfectly happy to wander the streets alone in the middle of the night, and it kind of glamorized the idea of isolation. The cat got spooked when it came too close and ran under our neighbour's car. I put my final cigarette out on the side of our house instead of the street, hopefully, hidden from the cat and other unsuspecting animals. I still haven’t fixed my sleep schedule, and I like to keep an eye out for the cat.
