Hello hello, lads and ladettes. Well. What an inauspicious start to my shiny new website and the escritorial renaissance implied in its creation. Also, what a way to drop the ball on #robynreadsshakespeare. And yet, for once, I am not wallowing in self-loathing or plagued by relentless guilt. This time – this one time – I am not at fault. I blame… FEELINGS. Between an absent lover and a sudden burst of light matriarchal treachery, the emotions have been, shall we say, intense.
So I thought, hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm, why not blog about this on my blog like a real blogger would?
Back in the old days, way way back, I mean, when the fiction of choice was The Babysitter’s Club and Sidney Sheldon (I was a weird kid okay?), the only thing that could cheer me up when life got too heavy was, you guessed it, reading. When Old Scratch, the step-father, would get started with the screaming and the smashing and the strangling, the best way – the only way – to cope was to crack open a second-hand paperback and read myself out of hell. I spent more time in Middle Earth and antebellum Georgia than I did in my house. And when I wasn’t reading, I was thinking about what I had been reading and imagining myself into the story (long before I knew what self-inset fan-fiction was). Books might not have saved my life, but they sure as hell saved my soul.
I don’t know when that changed, though.
Now I can’t read if I’m even the teeniest bit sad, and I sure as hell can’t read when I’m angry. My theory? I think it’s because reading is the activity I love most. I love it so much that I can’t have stand to have it tainted by bullshit. It’s my recharge time now, not my escape ladder or coping mechanism. Now, conditions have to be perfect:
A quiet space, preferably with lots of windows, and a comfy chair, and a blanket. Ideally, there would be a cat in the vicinity. Tea is an absolute necessity. Phones are verboten. Book is probably a hardcover (I know, I know, I hate me too) and there is definitely a back-up book just in case. Maybe two.
Hm. With those standards, maybe I shouldn’t be surprised that I’m not making much headway on my Goodreads challenge this year.
Back to the books, chums. Happy reading!
The Reading Robyn 