I had never smoked a cigarette or a cigar, but on New Year’s Eve 1997, everyone else was doing it. We were celebrating with the gusto of the twenty-somethings we were, new enough to legal drinking that it still felt thrilling. Someone brought cigars to ring in the new year. The guys started, and then the girls took their cigars for a few puffs and a photo opp, but I was harboring a secret. It was the same secret that kept me from drinking at my sister’s wedding four days earlier. It was easy to pretend there was liquor in my diet coke, but I had to feign overindulgence to decline a wedding party celebration shot without arousing suspicion.
It was a secret that made me the lone sober houseguest at the NYE bash in New Jersey, and it was the reason I held Matt’s cigar in the photo without taking a puff.
It was why I drove us home from New Jersey on New Year’s Day, although I am always the passenger. After less than an hour on the road, I pulled over on the side of I-95 so my husband of two and a half years could puke his guts out on the edge of the highway, because he had taken full advantage of my designated driver status. He has not played beer pong since.
We made it home without another detour, and I immediately ran upstairs to the bathroom while Matt collapsed on our bed. I took the test, waited impatiently for the result, and excitedly showed my prone spouse the stick.
Matt mumbled something incoherent, with much less enthusiasm than I thought the situation merited. I was annoyed at him, but my mood couldn’t be dampened by a hungover husband. It was January 1, 1998. It was a new year, and I was going to be a mother.
I still haven’t smoked a cigar, but I do have that stick, now over twenty years old. The pink line is barely visible, but it makes me smile every time I spy it in the back of the cabinet under my bathroom sink. My kids think it’s gross.
What a cool secret! And to still have the stick… what a memento!
What a sweet story!
Thanks!
I never smoke. I have never touched a cigar before. But my grandfather has the addiction, and once I too felt of tasting it..hehe!
That’s not an experience I would want to repeat!
Omg that picture!! I didn’t try the cigar either. Not since I puffed a cigarette visiting my sister at college and puked my guts up ten minutes later!!! And I totally remember that story. It’s a great one!! 😂
Isn’t it? Too bad I don’t have any photos of our Santa tray covered with jello shots from the year before that!
Such a cute story!! I haven’t held on to my pregnancy stick though – is that odd?
Sorry, as usual, I have not been consistent with my visits here!
It’s not odd – it may be odd to keep it though! I haven’t been consistent with visit either, Roshni – no need to apologize!
When I started reading this, I was afraid your secret would be something dark or sad. Way to build tension! You are a great story teller.
Thank you so much, Julia. I was trying to tease you a bit, but make you smile at the end.
That’s a great memory! I remember having to get through a party or two without drinking – without making it obvious that I wasn’t drinking. There were no cigars involved 🙂
Lucky you!
I never, ever had a desire to smoke a cigar! The smell of a cigar almost made me sick.
I’m from the time period when there were no sticks that let you know you were going to be a mother, so I don’t have any waiting to be discovered. It will be interesting to learn what informative ways several generations down the road will have to determine pregnancy.
In past generations it was more common for women to smoke cigars. It was a strange thing for me to learn.
I don’t mind a cigar smell nearly as much as a cigarette, but I’m with you – no desire to smoke one.
Definitely interesting post(s) this week. We’re all (to me) reflecting not just on memories (incited, stimulated or coaxed out of the past by a photo), but on the nature of the power of photos to ‘take us back in time’. A different experience say from music (that has a great but more fleeting effect) and memory.
Very good FTSF this week.
That’s an interesting comparison to music – I feel like my memories associated with music are deeper and more visceral than those elicited from a photograph.
OMG I still have my pregnancy stick too! I waited 24 hours to tell my husband. I don’t know why really, maybe I just needed to get used to it first myself. So your husband didn’t ask why you weren’t drinking or he knew that you thought you probably were? Fun story!
Oh, he knew why I wasn’t drinking, so he took advantage of a teetotaling wife on New Year’s Eve!
True confession: My grandfather (who lived with us) smoked cigars. One day my sister and I decided to try one of his cigars. For some reason, we thought that sitting on the roof of our younger brothers’ playhouse was the right spot for our rebellion. We ended up catching the playhouse on fire and, quite obviously, got busted.
Oh jeez – that sounds like it could have been much worse, Mo!
What a cute story! I have a smoking cigar picture but it’s real – from NYE 1999 and by the time I got home (my husband and I had to get a ride) I was barely make it to a trashcan. I’ll have to find a picture and tell the story or what I can recollect. LOL!
P.S. I can’t believe I didn’t save my pregnancy sticks. I peed on a three pack. LOL!
That’s hilarious, Kenya! At least you didn’t have to worry about aim;)
Now there’s a story! Wow. I also can’t believe the pink line is still there, that’s incredible. As for smoking, I had to smoke cigarettes on stage at college and my mother was horrified that I’d get hooked. I didn’t, thankfully.
Funny! That would never fly today – most places (in the US anyway) are nonsmoking, even for a play.
I cannot believe the pink line is still there!! I thought they disappeared for good.
And I haven’t smoked a cigar either! I love this.
It’s very faint, but it’s still there!
OMG I cannot believe you still have the stick!!! LOL!!! And, I have the opposite story – I had no clue I was pregnant and we had a “new house” party where I took full advantage of parting and celebrating, only to find out in the next couple days that I was pregnant. Oops! The real shock would come 8 weeks later when I found out there were TWO!…and then I could have really used a drink…:-)
Your way was less stressful, Allie! Well, maybe not after you found out about twins.
I totally still have both my positive pregnancy sticks from both my girls, too. And gross or not, will never part with them if I don’t have to either in all honesty.
Glad to know I’m not the only one, Janine.