Book With Legs

I read a lot. So much, in fact, I wonder whether it’s too much.

I live surrounded by books. Books I’ve read, books I want to read, books to which I refer, and too many books I borrowed or bought that I will never read but, in the interests of filling my newly expanded shelves, will probably continue to live with me.

I read more than books, of course, spending an hour or so every morning harvesting content from the internet that I read throughout the day. (As I recently detailed, I have a semi-automated typesetting apparatus that transfers these harvested articles from electrons into paper, permitting me to read them safe from the distracting allure of my flashing computer screen.)

There’s always something to read. I’m never satisfied. My brain’s a bottomless pit with a limitless capacity for more words. I feed it every chance I get.

I read instead of watching TV, preferring word consumption over image viewing.

I read while waiting, a practice that walls me off from the rest of you during my rare forays into the real world, such as waiting on line at the bank. Head buried deep in a book, oblivious to life, the bank could be robbed and I’d never know.

I read while walking, a sometimes dangerous practice that has, on occasion, torn my clothing, stubbed my toes and caused internal and external bleeding. For me and others.

I used to read while driving. Then I nearly killed myself by glancing at an article instead of braking. I reacted just in time. One more second, and who knows? So I started taking the bus and subway. It lengthened my two hour roundtrip commute to nearly three hours, but freed up two more hours each day to read.

I used to read while eating with others but, I since learned, this is rude to your eating companions. So I try to eat alone.

I used to read late into the night but this kept my wife awake and left me feeling groggy the next morning. So now I go to sleep one hour earlier and wake up two hours earlier, magically gaining an extra hour of reading each morning while avoiding the grogginess. I suspect that extra hour’s coming out of my life expectancy, but so long as I spend it reading who cares?

I’m a chain reader: on completing one piece of reading material my immediate reflex is to reach for the next piece instead of contemplating what I just read. I regret that, but there is so much to read, so little time to do it, so I must move ever on. I hope I’m sorting it all out in my subconscious.

In rare moments of repose, brought on by the temporary out-of-reachness of my next read, I wonder why I read so much. Is my reading a means to an end, or is it just an end in itself?

Perhaps I’ll find the answer in my next read.