366 days ago I smoked a cigarette. I didn’t much care for the way it tasted at the time, the aftertaste it left in my mouth, or the way it left me feeling.

This provided the perfect impetus for the decision that was to become an irrepressible fixture of my mind over the coming hours. Curious, I still had half a 50 gram pouch of Port Royal on the sofa behind me and more curious still, out in the lounge, in my secret hiding place, my cache of untouched duty-free totalled another 100 grams.

I can recall, 366 days ago, dropping the king-sized, super-slim butt into the makeshift ashtray which incidentally, I can recall some years earlier, consuming the baked beans that used to call the tin home.

I can recall, 365 days ago, feeling a little lost but assured by the knowledge that to break a promise to myself would engender a greater feeling of self-loathing than anything this world could do to me.

I can recall, 364 days ago, wondering if the mild inclination that I was currently feeling would ever grow into the juggernaut of compulsion that is reported by so many quitters.

I can recall 363 days, 362 days, 361 days, 360 days, 359 days, 358 days – it’s at about this point that not smoking became the routine.

That was it. No profound cravings, no withdrawals, no irrational rationalisation, no deals with the Devil…

Just no more smoking.

Article by Tim Walker

Edited by John Player

Photography by John Brandon