What books do you want to read?
…said Hamlet.
When I was a kid I was a voracious reader. I’d get those fifty cent sci-fi paperbacks and devour them like a hungry space monster. The prices would go up but that didn’t slow me down. I read constantly (though it helped to not have friends or the internet to distract me).
After high school graduation, I had what I call my “reading year.” I didn’t have a real job during that year, so I went to the public library, and have often said the only thing I didn’t take out was that cute blonde librarian. (I still regret not handing over my library card and saying, “I’d like to take you out.”) I sampled the works of Freud, read their complete collection of Jung, and discovered Tom Wolfe, Ken Kesey, and Jack Kerouac. Every book was a branch to another area of study: psychology, mythology, spirituality. I then discovered the art wing and started reading novels and plays, and took out classical music LPs. My mind and knowledge expanded exponentially.
In academia, as a student, I mostly read the assigned readings and often not anything for pleasure, though I still dabbled in that. As a professor, my reading shifted to essays (and then bad essays, as students became worse writers), with fewer books placed on my pleasure reading list.
Now, I have to admit I have some trouble focusing on reading. I still want to, but so many other things clamor for my attention—streaming video, demanding people, just the daily routine of life. The last book I read was Mary Trump’s Too Much and Never Enough (which explained so much), but before that…I just don’t remember.
Maybe someday, when I have time to just sit and relax, I’ll read again. For the moment I relish many of the things that keep me busy so I don’t want to trade those in for quiet reading time. Not yet anyway.
MUSOFYR 