a million in one

It isn't easy to avoid smoking if you've been doing it for a while. It's easy to quit but challenging to not start again. Anyone can avoid doing something once, especially if they've got something to prove, or something to gain.The thing is, and you try to convince yourself otherwise when you haven't had a cigarette in a while, that you can't smoke only one. A cigarette isn't a singular thing. To smoke one is to smoke many. When you smoke one, you smoke whole packs, cartons, generations. Every puff is a precursor to a hundred nicotine holocausts. There are, surely, biochemical explanations for why this may be the case, but I don't intend to invoke them. I don't think the mechanistic explanation does much to convey the counterintuitive nature of the thing. After you smoke a cigarette, you aren't back to square one. You're on a road that leads straight to Emphysemaville. You can be the mayor of Emphysemaville if you want. There are no term limits...the incumbency unto death.How much time is spent trying to get back to square one, I wonder. You can't get back.