Reading books, novels in particular, is my ocean.
I’ve heard people call their morning ocean swim the most important thing they do all day. It’s healing, connects them to something bigger than themselves and gives them strength to face the world.
That’s me with a book.
I read my first proper book when I was in Year One. I’m talking no pictures, novel, hardback. I was the youngest child in my family and I had seen everyone else at home read books and was desperate to do the same. I have no idea what the book was about, then or now, but I remember sitting on a cream couch upstairs in always muggy Brisbane reading. Mum and dad would walk past letting me be. My brothers would throw things at my head. I was on a mission. I was so proud of myself even if I was only reading the words but hadn’t yet worked out what a storyline was.
I felt special with a book in my hand. I could go places. I could experience things I never imagined I would. My mind and my body were hit. I had the breath stolen from me when reading the most vivid or beautiful sentence. My heart stopped when a character betrayed me. I calculated plotline possibilities. I felt comforted, angry, upset, joyful, expanded.
In really good books I would read and then re-read passages.
I thought that was just me.
How did they write that?
I want to dive in and save you.
I want to dive in and hit you.
When I love a sentence, or a phrase, I fold the bottom of the page so I can go back at the end of the book and read it again.
Years and years ago I started a book club. I tell my children to read. I think a house without a bookshelf lacks a soul.
I ended up writing two novels myself (The Unknown Woman and Under The Influence). And yes, they are published novels not sitting in a top drawer novels. I was proud again too (and exhausted and scared) and the same family that watched me on that cream couch came and watched me launch two books with warm speeches and some mediocre champagne.
Now I can’t read a page.
For the last year or so my mind wanders constantly. It twitches. My fingers do aerobics across tiny little screens. The nightly routine of jumping into bed with a novel has been replaced with jumping into bed with my iPhone. I circle the world with swipes and taps. Grazing on this story from New York and snacking on that one from Puerto Rico. Checking work emails. Watching Tina Fey bloopers. Watching three girls dressed in the American flag sing at a Donald Trump rally. Back to Instagram and Facebook. Bits and pieces. A couple of intellectual arguments that I praise myself for finding. Back to the entire world, all its knowledge and billions of people. Swipe, swipe. Tap, tap. Make this pic bigger so I can see it properly.
My fingers go nuts. It’s a deep, bright, glowing hole. Then I can’t go to sleep so I find more light. There’s always more to skim.
Listen to an episode from our podcast series ‘I know what you’ll read this summer’ below.
The twitching mind is not quarantined to night. It follows me everywhere. Now, if I’m having a drink or coffee with someone and they go to the counter I pull my phone out and check something. I’ve stopped sitting still to watch the couple speaking in short, sharp sentences next to me, or the dog tied up outside, or the lonely person in the corner pretending they’re not lonely.
There’s news, gossip, friends updates, funny videos at my fingertips. There’s always the weather. Head down. It’s going to be -9 and snowy in Moscow on Friday .
Even if I’m at home I often find myself with my phone in my hand. If it’s not in my hand I make sure I know where it is. Then I’m settled for a moment. Until I think there is something else I need to check or discover or snack on.
Last night I was so tired of this master. Sick of it. Angry at myself. I’ve read a couple of books in the last year, but not nearly as many as I would like. The constant snacking was making me thick and foggy. Has been making me thick and foggy for a while now. That thing called creativity was walking away from me. Being led away by a mind that can’t be still. That moves and darts and doesn’t want to miss out.
I wanted peace. One story. One long story. With a small number of people and emotions that I sometimes thought were my emotions.
So I set a timer. 20 minutes. If I can’t read a book for 20 minutes something is seriously wrong with me. It’s 20 minutes.
I grabbed a book I’ve been wanting to read for ages from the bookshelf. Richard Flanagan’s The Narrow Road to the Deep North. I put the timer on. I told the kids to give me 20 minutes. I sat in bed and read.
I went to grab my phone for no reason a few times and I stopped myself. I don’t even know what I was going to do or check with it. 20 minutes.
The buzzer went off. I had done it. I felt ridiculously and embarrassingly good.
Before I put the book down I marked a page at the bottom like I used to. Carefully folding the paper on an angle.
Dorrigo Evans was asked “Why did he love words so” by his lover.
“C’mon Dorry,” Amy said. “Why?”
“They were the first beautiful thing I ever knew,” Dorrigo Evans said.
I left my bedroom and joined the real world.
Later that night, when I was really going to bed, I put the timer on for another 20 minutes. I made about 15 and had to turn it off because the solidity of the black and white, what those words were made to become by a gifted writer and the one, long story I had started on made me want to sleep and dream so I had the strength to face the world tomorrow.
I think the lifeforce may be on its way back.
Top Comments
When I read a book and find the words put magnificently one after another into the sentences and the sentences flow like a water I stop my breath to admire them. I go back again and again, love them, note them, underline them, copy them onto any available paper, think of them and ah, all about loving them. No matter what the book is about nor who is the author. My nightcase is constantly adorned with books. From the library. I will never again buy the books nor bookshalf.
It's become easier to use my Kindle app for reading, rather than a standard book, for so many reasons but it's almost all non-fiction, maybe one or two novels on the shelf. (I don't know why, I've just always preferred non-fiction and had some difficulty getting into fiction)