My Drug of Choice
Yesterday I was sitting on a stalled path train …
(for non tri-state people, that’s the subway that goes from Manhattan to New Jersey) for nearly five minutes before noticing that the train had, in fact, stalled.
That’s because I was, as I can be found most mornings, engrossed in a book. (This one, this week. It’s charming and sad and lovely. So, worth the hype so far.)
I happened to glance up and see the irritation and fatigue on my fellow passengers’ faces. Because most of them were just sitting there. Without a book. And I thought, why would anyone ever go anywhere, particularly an underground public transit system prone to delays, without a book?
When I got home yesterday, I got some not-so-great news. I reacted in what I suppose was an appropriate manner, then (not so) patiently got through my evening routine so I could dive into bed, and back into my book. So I could escape the world.
This has been my modus operandi for literally as long as I can remember. When I got yelled at as a child, when I was having issues with my friends in middle school, or with my parents in high school, my mind would instantly slide sideways to a favorite read, and I would feel better.
Because I knew the world I was currently in, filled to the brim with its problems, could be escaped. I held that escape in my hand.
So I guess books are my drug of choice. They’re what I flee to, what I’m addicted to, what I turn to when the world is a wrong-sized shoe. They comfort me and distract me and make me feel so much less alone.
I think that’s why I want to be am a writer. Because if it weren’t for books, I don’t know where I’d be. I think the greatest thing I will ever accomplish in this life will have someone, someday, say that that a story I wrote served this purpose for them.
I have to remind myself sometimes how incredibly lucky I am to have something I love so much so easily accessible to me. And then I feel sorry for the people who don’t have that. To each their own and all, but I don’t understand how people who don’t read books survive.
So thank you, books, for always being there for me. I honestly have no idea what I’d do without you.
Photo by Will Tarpey on Unsplash
Touche my friend! I’m exactly the same way, after a hard day I can’t wait for the moment when the kids are asleep and I can plop down in bed with what I am currently reading. The flipside however, is when I can’t find a book to satisfy me. I’m currently in a book slump. You have to recommend a good one for me.
B – me before you …. is a fantastic book. I lovedddddddddddddd it. It takes your emotions and put them straight in battle with your sensible brain. You know things won’t work out – can’t work out but you keep fighting for them.
There is a 2nd book to this; I have it at home but I’ve not been able to get into it as quickly as I did with this book.
Ah reading slumps are the worst. Have you read everything by Jandy Nelson? Stephanie Perkins? Have you read any Tana French?
Stephanie Perkins. Will check out the other two!
I am a fellow book addict. I can not believe people who fly without books. So many delays everywhere. I read “You Before Me” and loved it!