When is it we tell ourselves we have made a serious, mistake in our lives and we know we are going to have to suffer the consequences of our actions for the rest of our lives, or maybe less if we have managed to pick a mistake that is in fact fixable ... but in most cases they are irreversible.

I grew up in a smoke-free home. My parents did not smoke, and although we had plenty of relatives who did smoke, it just wasn't something that had ever crossed my mind to do. As little kids, we used to pick these skinny little grass strands, light them and I guess you could say, simulate the actions of a smoker, but to actually put a cigarette in my mouth as a child was not something I ever did or wanted to do.

At 15 I met a young man, a military man who smoked, and yes I know that is definitely something that fits within the realms of this theme I could write about right now, but won't, so we'll just stick to the cigarette escapade for now, and even though he and I ended up getting married when I was 16 and were together for 8 years, his smoking did not entice me to pick up a cigarette and smoke it ... but too much wine and a left-behind pack of cigarettes in my house did!

In 1969 my husband was stationed in Alaska for a year, and I returned home, yes with a little boy of 18 months, oh how the story continues, and I went back to high school to finish up my Junior Year. During that time, I had a sister who was a Junior and she and I bonded as teenagers as we never had a chance to before. She smoked, I did not. She drank, I did not. But by the time the year was over, I smoked, and I drank! Crazy how teenagers manage to turn their lives upside down without ever thinking about the consequences that will come to haunt them years down the road after they grow up and have settled deep within their lives.

One night I pulled a cigarette from a pack of Camel (non-filter) cigarettes that had been left at my house after my sister and a bunch of our friends had left. I walked into the bathroom, looked in the mirror, and put it in my mouth. Did I think I looked cool? Yeah, I guess I did, plus the Boones Farm Apple Wine was telling me I looked cool, so I lit it. Instant vertigo! Wow, I was so dizzy I could hardly stand, it was worse than the wine I'd drank too much of. I put it in the sink, crawled over to my bed and up on top of it, and lay there thinking about how anyone could ever smoke such an awful thing! I don't remember anything for the rest of that night.

I haven't even got a clue as to why I did this, but it is a moment in my life that will never ever be put behind me as something good I ever did. I drove to the store the very next day and bought myself a pack of Marlboro Reds and from that day forward, for the next 37 years, minus 1 year and 5 months in between where I'd put them aside, I smoked.

My Regrets: Lighting up that first cigarette, being weak-minded with no willpower to stop me from damaging a perfectly, almost healthy body at the time, that would come up to slap me full force with diseases that would go un-founded for years until that fateful day when you are told you have Emphysema and it is irreversible, and that is just another disease to add to the Lupus, Fibromyalgia, Graves' Disease, Primary Biliary Cirrhosis, Cancer, and God knows what else is lurking inside this old body as I get older ... some of what may have, I say may have, been prevented if I'd only taken care of myself and not smoked that first cigarette. I read about the toxins in the cigarettes, and I cringe to think I inhaled that for many years, caused my children and loved ones to inhale it for many years and now I must live with the guilt of knowing that I may not have only hurt myself all these years, but how many others did I hurt in the process of me "just thinking that I was cool!"