After watching a few episodes of Mad Men on Netflix, I couldn't resist the allure of the lifestyle of constant smoking and drinking, and decided one day to go out and buy some cigarettes and get myself a drink.

I bought a pack of Marlboro 100's ( I think) after ignoring the 3 omens that told me not to buy any. Previously I would just go up to the checkout counter and just stand there to look at products, yet knowing that I would never buy any. Today, was a different day, today I was going in to buy them, breaking my silent promise. The bar across the parking lot didn't have a light or matches, so I could not enjoy a drink and smoke.

I then bought a lighter and headed to the park.

it was a wet cloudy evening surrounded by dirt and trees. I pulled up to the lake, parked the car with some instrumental music playing. I drink fireball and light up a cigarette. I see the beauty of life all around me, there are ugly ducks in the distance hobbling around, unaware of the cares of mankind, realizing that at this moment I was alive, being present in the moment in this park, with those ugly ducks minding their own business, on a seemingly purple blue gloomy afternoon. I hear the cadence of the fountain on the lake, a lake being home to a small island patch of land in the middle. No man's land.

I inhaled and marveled at the holistic nature of the universe, and how I was present in this moment enjoying an experience. I walked to the dock and sat down in the light rain, holding fireball in brown paper I finish.

I look, I breath the fresh air, and realize that I am the culmination of every decision I have ever made, everything that I have ever produced into the world, and my future path is paved by me. As I looked down to my dirty filter, I was in utter aw of the beauty of life.

As I walked I noticed a tree branch cracking under its own weight, It was in the shape of a wishbone, and as it cracked it fell from its higher perch to fall onto a lower branch balanced right through the middle where the two wishbone halves meet. I thought, "Oh how interesting, life can go either way depending on how you pull, fate is a randomly beautiful collection of events caused by cause and effect.

I threw away my 'last cigarette' in the trash, honoring it as I know it was killing me, and drove back to a worried home.

That was about a month and half ago, or about 12 packs ago.

Don Draper sold me an experience, I love it, and I love to hate it, but it is not the paper that matters, but the attitude holding the paper.

Don't pick up smoking, it is a slippery slope and a nasty habit that kills slowly from the inside out, but Don Draper is the Best Ad Man ever.

I keep searching for peace in a sense of chemical enlightenment, pushing through to be whole so that I may continue on.