When I get into bed at night (well, when I get back into bed after having been there since coming home from work, then brush my teeth, then return to bed for the actual sleep act of the evening’s entertainment), mostly stop looking at my phone, and get in the groove with reading my book, that is the moment when I truly let go these days.
I feel safe. The worry that’s been following me around allllllllllll day finally gets too tired to bother me, like a kid sibling who’s been repeating all your sentences back to you and then gives up once you just stop talking, giving them no more words to fuel their mission of annoyance. Once they stop getting a reaction out of you, all the fun dissipates and they go find something else to do – maybe they even go and, like me, read a book.
I’d say for several years now I’ve very consciously been using books to escape reality, and while a therapist may not love that statement, honestly I’m pretty OK with it. Because it's not like I don't LIVE in reality -- I put in my time at work and everywhere else, but when I crack open that novel or Calvin & Hobbes collection of strips, that's my little break. And it's a break that serves me very seriously well.
I don’t know what it is about words on a page, but I am reflexively drawn to them, want to bond with them like someone you meet at a party and just can’t stop jabbering with, passing back and forth quotes from your favorite TV shows, rapid-fire swapping childhood stats – hometowns, number of siblings, shared high school extracurriculars.
It’s fascinating to me that I can have such a natural relationship with a thing that is man-made – humans don’t need the written language to survive, yet it is indeed what keeps me functioning. This is fascinating to me in the way that certain people are so adept at playing guitar or piano. Singing, yes, that’s natural, we can all do it – a voice comes pre-packaged in a person’s body. But the six strings of a guitar, the 88 keys of an upright? Doesn’t make sense how someone – very many someones, in fact – can be so gifted in interacting with such tools, and moreover to pick up those instrumental skills rather quickly. I mean, it’s weird, right? It is.
Maybe it’s no less weird than how some people are more in step with urban surroundings than others. While one may have been exposed to concrete and steel structures their whole life, it still doesn’t make it inherently natural for a human to interact with them, does it? And for some, modern decor and white, drab, beige walls and sofas and throw blankets and clothes and and and…make us sad. Some people need to be around some good old wood paneling in a basement to feel safe, happy, connected with life and humanity. Not that wood paneling is actual nature or an actual tree with roots in the ground that one would have to step outside to see, but for a girl born in the 80s who grew up in modern American suburbs it’s close, OK?
I don’t know what I’m saying. I love to read. I need to read.
I remember as a kid hearing the message that reading is so important, and one really needs to be able to read, and wondering in response: why? I wasn't a book hater, but I genuinely wondered why it mattered. It wasn't like knowing to look both ways before crossing the street or to avoid touching metal if you were outside in a thunderstorm, or to understand which foods have which vitamins to make you strong.
I mean honestly -- and I say this as a pretty clearly established book lover -- I still don't have an answer other than that being literate allows you to read various things like signs and menus and warning labels on paint cans. Some years back I looked into local programs that I might get involved in to help teach adults to read, and while I never fully pursued it I learned from my brief period of research about the concept of "functional literacy," which is just that -- being able to read signs and such, enough to be able to live more safely and inclusively in the society around you.
Anyway, I'm not sure what exactly I thought way back when when I saw people like Maya Angelou on PBS or some other celebrity on a "READ" poster in the library say that we "need to read," but I think that probably my general pushback reaction was that reading beyond what we were told to read for school was really just a hobby, and aren't hobbies kind of a person by person choice?
And I still feel that way. I hear people say now, "Oh I really should read," "I need to read more," and I often tell them no you don't. It's like trying to force yourself to watch a TV show you don't like, listen to music that grates on you, or try to pick up knitting or flyfishing if you really just don't care. I love reading so much, it is my absolute most favorite activity, but there is a whole long listttttttttt of things that I could CARE LESS about doing and that's fine. And if someone's a super talented painter or beermaker or nail tech, then I'd rather have them gracing the world with that specific skill that I don't have so that a) I can enjoy the fruits of their labor and b) so they're not losing time to some other forced, would-be hobby, thus preventing me from looking at their sweet timelapse videos on Instagram or drinking their handcrafted suds or helping me relax while they attentively sweep hot pink polish onto my fingertips.
So all this to say: I love to read. And pretty soon I'm going to close this laptop and brush my teeth and snurgle up with the cat and get my nose in a book! And it's gonna be great. But if you're not into it that's totes fine, Friend.
So what do you think? Is it weird that we interact and "bond" so well with these creations and buildings and things that humans have come up with, even though we don't naturally need them to live? (Although, now, maybe we do??? Since we're past an era where all of our time had to go to tending the land and hunting our dinners, do we in fact, actually need books and guitars and fancy architecture and roller coasters to keep us alive? I mean, from the standpoint of someone who's in her head all the time and can easily get depressed, I will say that I very much count on these things to keep me happy and focused and moving forward -- to fill my time, if nothing else.)
And is it weird to say that we NEED to read? I mean even though I need to read, I still think it's weird that we say that! Ha! Like there should be a follow up tagline to go with that slogan! Because kids' favorite question is "Why?", we all know this. So librarians and teachers and parents, I'm just saying, you better have a comeback ready when you tell the youths of today that they need to read. Or else those children are just going to bypass Ramona and that -- to me, at least -- would be tragic.
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