"Happy" Birthday

When I was a kid, my birthday was a moderately large affair. While I am an only child my extended family is gigantic: three aunts, two uncles, ten cousins, one grandfather, three great aunts and, now, about a dozen second cousins....and that's just on my mother's side.

Christmas in the 80s and 90s was divided up among my mother, her mother, and her sisters. Christmas Eve was spent at my Aunt Sissy's (nicknamed by my oldest cousin who, as a child, could not pronounce "Christine") house. Christmas Day was in Nana's tiny apartment, where we exchanged gifts and ate ham sandwiches. Later that evening we went to Aunt Linda's house for dinner and dessert. My mom, apparently feeling out of the loop, turned my birthday into her version of a Christmas party.

This, obviously, worked just fine for me. 30 or 40 people generally meant at least 15 presents, and since my birthday was just after Christmas people shopped clearances and sales, getting huge discounts on otherwise expensive items.

Yeah, I was spoiled.

In a lot of ways, I still am. I no longer celebrate the extravagant parties of my youth, but I still generally ask for gifts on a whim and usually receive them. Last year I got a new laptop, this year, a new acoustic guitar.

Birthdays used to take on a strong air of significance. People would ask me if I "felt any older", and I would lie and say that I did. Obviously, there's no huge physical or mental change on the day you turn 13 or 14...even turning 16 meant a three or four month wait until I could get a driver's license. People seem to stop asking that question after your 21st birthday, but I think that's when the question can be answered honestly.

I turned 32 yesterday, and I do feel older...older than I've ever felt. My age is now used as a basis of comparison:

- There are kids driving around in cars right now that weren't even born when I got my license.
- There are countless Pittsburghers who do not remember the Pirates having a winning season.
- My step son was 9 when I first met him (and I was 24), now he's 17.
- My daughter was born when I was 26.
- College football superstars were still in diapers when I was playing football in high school.

My wife absolutely hates birthdays. She hates birthdays that are years away (she complains about being "almost 40" when she is, in fact, 33). I think the depression of aging hits females harder. Women are constantly reminded of stereotypes about beauty, sexuality, fertility, and how it changes with age.

Men and women, however, do share that same sense of wasting away the years. Who knows what I could've accomplished over the past decade if I didn't spend so much of it cooped up in my room, in front of a computer. How many nights did I waste on AOL (another concept that makes me feel tremendously old)? Why do I feel like I was destined for great things but settled for something that was easier...less challenging? What would've happened if I didn't waste my full ride scholarship at my first college?

A lot of the times my life feels like a mess, as if it was a jigsaw puzzle and I was forcing pieces into the wrong parts, just so I could say I finished it.

Age isn't just a number...it's a landmark.

No Santa Doesn't Mean No Secrets

I'm not sure when I stopped believing in Santa, but I'm sure it was relatively early. My cousins were all older than me, and as soon as they found out I'm certain I was informed as well. I don't remember how I took the news, but as far as I know it didn't scar me for life or anything.

One year I had asked for a computer for Christmas. It seemed like an extremely tall order. My parents were not exactly rolling in money (mom gave private piano lessons at home for $10 a pop and went to school part time to become a pharmacy tech, Dad was a math teacher). Being an only child balances out the financial impact of the holidays quite a bit, or at least it did for me. But, generally my "big" presents were in the $50-$75 range: a new bike, a new baseball glove, a CD player, etc. Computers, in 1992, cost thousands of dollars, and that's not even an exaggeration.

I wasn't even entirely sure what a computer did, beyond the capability to play Oregon Trail or Number Crunchers. Dad brought one home from school and kept it in the den for a few weeks (an Apple IIe, in case you're wondering how old I am), and I was fascinated by it. I could type words and they would show up on the screen. I could put in a different disk and make a pie chart (I was, and remain, a gigantic nerd). When Dad had to take it back I was heartbroken, and that's when the thirst for my own computer began.

A few months later I was walking home from school and my friend (I always blame friends for bad habits) said that he had discovered all of his parents' hiding places for Christmas presents. Honestly, before that moment I had not considered the possibility that there were gifts hiding around the house. I don't know what the alternative would've been: perhaps they bought all of the presents on Christmas Eve after I went to bed, or something.

I got home before my parents did. Mom was on the PTA and they had an after-school meeting. Dad did not usually get home until 4:00. So, I began my search.

I guess Mom and Dad did not really think of me as a snoop, because their hiding places were laughably obvious: their walk-in closet in the bedroom, the nook behind the stairs in the basement, and in the den closet was the bounty: a brand new Apple IIGS, still in the box.

I was floored. I knew that the computer alone cost $1,000 (Dad received educational catalogs in the mail that usually included computers on sale). Monitors back then weren't cheap items, either, and the computer was useless without some software. All told, I would bet they paid almost $2,000 for this marvel of modern man.

I closed the closet door and spent the next four weeks acting like I didn't see a thing. I have a terrible poker face now, at 32, so I can't imagine it was any better 20 years ago. But I never admitted to looking, and they never outwardly assumed that I already knew.

Understanding that Santa was more of a myth than a man, that was something I got over pretty quickly, although it's terribly hard to remember that I have kids in the house now that still worship that jolly old man (my daughter was concerned that, since our chimneys were sealed, Santa could not make it inside; I had to explain that I open up the flues on Christmas Eve). But I never got over the ability to snoop for my gifts. It became more of an addiction than anything: right after Thanksgiving I would begin my hunt, and rarely was a gift unwrapped on Christmas Day that I didn't already know about.

I've learned my lesson as a kid. Presents for my children are nearly locked in a vault, inaccessible to all underage eyes. If they ever consider sneaking around, searching for the present stash, they are bound to be disappointed.

I may not be able to keep the dream of Santa alive, but I've made it my mission to ensure that every single Christmas is a day of surprises.

I Want Out of Flavor Country

I started smoking at 19. On an increasingly growing list of life mistakes, this is still near the top. I can handle the mess I've made of my credit history. I'm not thrilled about the weight I've gained over the past decade. I can even live with buying a "fixer-upper" of a house but not being handy enough to actually FIX things, but nothing has been more destructive to my life than being a heavy smoker.

I'll be 32 in a few weeks, and I estimate that I will have spent, conservatively, $32,000 on cigarettes. If I had $32,000 right now, I could pay off any credit cards, completely finish renovations on our house, and have enough left over to take a pretty nice vacation. And that's just the financial impact.

I'm winded when I take the stairs. I spend each morning nearly dry heaving all of the tar and junk that's accumulated in my lungs from the previous day's debaucheries. I smell like an ash tray. And, since the smoking ban that is enforced in nearly every city, I have to spend chunks of my day outside, shivering and puffing in the gorgeous Pittsburgh winter weather.

I'd be lying if I said I've ever made a serious attempt at quitting. The only time I went more than a few days without a cigarette was when I was hospitalized with a very, very serious strain of influenza. It was so serious the doctors initially thought I had contracted meningitis, but an extremely painful spinal tap proved them wrong. I was quarantined in my room for four days (or that's what the medical assistant told me when she was arranging my discharge paperwork...time was a bit of a blur). I told them I was a smoker and they gave me a patch, as well as a prescription for more patches after I was released. I'd say I made it 10 days, before I woke up and just felt like having a cigarette.

Lighting up that first cigarette after nearly two weeks...that's definitely in my top 10 list.

I have all the reason in the world to quit: as a family we could use the extra money, as the father to a 5 year old I'd definitely want to raise her into adulthood without dealing with lung cancer or emphysema.

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When I think of an "addict", I think of a person that is so chemically attached to a drug that he would do anything to get more of it into his system. I don't know if smokers completely fit that description, which is also why I believe that cigarette addiction is 20% chemical and 80% psychological.

How often do smokers smoke in their sleep?
Or on airplanes?
Or in an office?
Or at a movie?

We are capable of going hours without a cigarette. And yet, the first thing I do after grabbing my luggage off of the conveyor belt is step outside and light up.

Nicotine replacement has always sort of bothered me. I'm trying to quit smoking, so I'm replacing smoking with a product that has just the addictive ingredient in smoking. Sure, I'll be inhaling much less tar and carbon monoxide, but I'll still be a nicotine addict. Studies suggest that complete nicotine withdrawal takes about two weeks, from a physiological perspective. So after 14 days of no cigarettes you can safely assume that any withdrawal symptoms are 100% mental.

What I need is a reward. A tangible prize for going one day without a cigarette, then two days, then five years. I think part of the reason cessation fails is because people forget why they quit, and they want the instant gratification that only a cigarette can provide. I'm not a capitalist by nature, but I think my plan would work:

On the first day I stop smoking, I will go to the bank and take out $150. Each day I go without a cigarette I will put $5.00 into a piggy bank (or the masculine, grown-up equivalent of a piggy bank). That $5.00 is how much I'm saving by not picking up a single cigarette that day. It's how much I wasted on slowly killing myself.

That way, any time I feel a craving, any time I had a rough day, any time I'm bored, or I'm stressed out, I can look at that pile of cash and think "I'm sure there's a less harmful way of dealing with whatever issues I have today." And I know that there is. There's billions of non-smokers out there that have never considered a cigarette to be an answer, and I want to be one of them.