Words to Eat

My dearest darlings, have I ever fallen behind.

It's not that I haven't thought about writing, or that I haven't been doing any divination or ritual work or dreaming any interesting dreams or making any progress. It's just that my schedule, here lately, has eaten me alive and spat back out something that I am not entirely sure is still me, something I'm not entirely sure I recognize.

Something smaller, with softer edges, perhaps.

There is much to discuss, but let's start at the top.

It's Valentine's Day.



I made myself a nice list of goals to accomplish by this date. I haven't accomplished all of them. A thorough deconstruction of progress and achievements and failures is to follow. Here I'd like to focus on one.

I said that I would quit smoking.

By Valentine's Day, at the latest. I said that it would probably be by January 15, or definitely by February 1, or the 7th, or the 10th, but definitely by the 14th.

Thursday, the 9th, I woke up sick as fuck. I am accustomed to the peculiar illnesses visited upon me by this addiction. Without fail, once or twice a year, a particularly bad allergy spell will yield sinus infection-turned-bronichitis-turned pneumonia. I will put off seeking medical attention until I am physically incapable of anything at all, stumble my semi-contrite ass into urgent care and stumble back out four hours later with a host of nasty prescriptions. I will make all sorts of promises and vows to myself, often while attempting to choke down a cigarette in between doses of bronchial dialating inhalers.

I want to quit smoking. I've tried almost everything, mundane and ritual alike. Patches, cold turkey, brainwashing, terribly abusive self-talk. Healing rituals, bindings, sacrifices, desperate pleas for assistance from anyone I thought might listen. I've thrown so much magic and intent at this goal of quitting over the years that, well, you'd think that if I had any skillz whatsoever I'd be long past the whole fiasco.

As I told a dear friend, when I set out upon this endeavor, how bad-ass can I possibly be if I can't even quit this?


So, Thursday, the 9th. Staring down the barrel of my deadline, I wake up sick as fuck. This sickness has no regard for the established traditions. This sickness showed up with no warning right in my chest and refused to move. I stubbornly kept smoking and it stubbornly got worse until yesterday, Monday, I spent the entire day in bed.

Like, 36 hours of nothing but making myself tea and going back to sleep.

I know that it's going to sound ludicrous to anyone who isn't me - I made myself really sick! With magic! It's not like smokers get sick all the fucking time or anything. But I know my body, and I know how I get sick, and I pay attention to the signals, and this was 100% out of nowhere.

You don't have to buy it, it's cool, because it's not something I'm advertising with pride. It's not like this was my goal, exactly. I was really hoping that the willpower fairy would visit and drop some tough in my purse to pull out whenever I needed it. No luck.

I got out of bed today, and took care of everything I needed to take care of, and even though it's only been two days, about, I'm saying it now: I quit. I am done. No more smoking for me.

That's one goal I will count as a success, at least.