Priorities

Just the knowledge that a good book is awaiting one at the end of a long day makes that day happier.  ~ Kathleen Norris

Lately I've been struggling to keep up my usual stamina with reading. It isn't that I don't still love it. I genuinely enjoy reading once I've started. It's not even that it's too hard to start reading in the first place. It's the idea of "making time" so I can start in the first place.

It's a simple thing to say "How to read a book? Why, just do it. Start and don't stop until you've finished." This is partly true, of course. If you're not quite sure what your priorities are in life, just look at what you make time for--not what you have to do (this includes work, grocery shopping, laundry, etc.) but what you sacrifice sleep in order to do AFTER you've done what you needed to do.

I've taken to reading at night. I have a very strict bedtime or else I honestly would never STOP reading, so this is a special, relaxing time as I gorge myself on literature and try to stuff as many chapters into my head as possible in about a twenty minute timeslot.  

Weekends are the obvious choice to make any headway in reading. But then, weekends are also the obvious choice in making any headway on all the other things I need to do weekly, but end up not doing weeknights because I'm too tired. Then again, books are more relaxing a past-time than, say, yoga or base-jumping.  

I've always prided myself on the volume of my reading. Reading a hundred books a year? Piece of cake. Reading a page a minute? Yep, I've timed that. Reading several books at one time? How could I restrain myself?  

Now that I'm having to budget my time more wisely, however, I'm seeing the value of reading for quality more than quantity. I choose my books more carefully, weeding out some of the titles I only wanted to read on a whim or from peer pressure or because it was made into a movie. I'm focusing on reading for instruction, yes, but the emphasis is also on pleasure. 

Because life is too short to read ho-hum books.