READ MORE

One of my New Year’s resolutions is to READ MORE.

I do a lot of reading with the children and a lot of reading for work, but I rarely have the time or mental fortitude to read simply for PLEASURE.

This desire to be consumed by a good book has been slowly rising to the surface over the last few months of 2008, I’ve tamped it down each time by reading something with Zen or flipping through a magazine, but the crescendo came while vacationing in Barbados.

With all that “FREE time”, no work, no taxiing to and fro, no demands, I actually had the OPPORTUNITY to READ (not listen to) a whole novel from cover to cover and experience the bliss that has been gurgling up for a while now. The book of choice was Khaled Hosseini’s A Thousand Splendid Suns and though I hate reading books out of sequence, I proceeded to do so with this one and was hooked in no time! The first night, I read at least 15 chapters, and another one as I woke up the next morning and each night I read despite the mosquitoes buzzing loudly over hear or the invitations to go out … I was completely ensconced, transported to Kabul, I was no longer in Barbados, I was in Kabul, I saw Kabul, smelled Kabul, tasted Kabul…I was Miriam’s neighbor, I was the fly on Laila’s bedroom wall, I was Tarik’s leg and Rasheed’s belt. Now, some will read this book and wonder why I was so enthralled with it, perhaps the book will not have the same magic to another reader, maybe it will…for me, it matters not! What does matter to me is that again a door that had slowly inched closed has been thrusted open once more and have begun to pursue this escape yet again.

I will no longer allow myself to use the excuse of no time and no energy, I will use the tools afforded my to experience this escape...for cryin out loud I work in a library and audiobooks are the perfect tool for a wandering mind…so far I’ve been able to “read” The House at Sugar Beach (Helene Cooper), The Brief and Wonderous Life of Oscar Wao (Junot Diaz), A Thousand Splendid Suns(Khaled Hosseini), and Eat, Pray, Love (Elizabeth Gilbert)next God of Small Things (Arundhati Roy), Life of Pi , Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)…the sky’s the limit!