A Book a Day

Every once in awhile, I get out of the habit of reading on a regular, usually daily, basis. Often this is the indirect fault of media–TV or internet–but sometimes it’s because I haven’t encountered a good book in awhile so I start dragging my feet. This time, I think it was a combination of free Food Network shows and the reading of a few books that were a tad too slow to develop. So there I was, watching all the people around me scramble for New Years goals. I had been waiting for mine to arise organically–it could take all month–when it occurred to me that I need to read something and read it fast to pull out of my dry spell.

Actually, it happened more like this:

It was snow day number two, and all four of us were home once again. I had decided that on day one I would do some home projects (see the awesome book stairs that I have been working on), day two I would do some writing and reading, and day three I would clean the house. (Blech.) My much less uptight husband had no agenda, and so decided after a few rounds of Acquire and Risk that he wanted to watch The Princess Bride with the family. Suddenly our very different agenda/non-agendas merged into focus as a weird goal. I thought I could read The Princess Bride before we even got to watching the movie. I had always wanted to read it and I was pretty sure we had a copy. This odd goal would help me, overall, get away from hours of TV before bed and back to my love, books.

My search for The Princess Bride on the shelves was unfruitful. Apparently, we either don’t own it and never did, or we gave it away, or it is in that one box of books still buried in the garage. Amid my disappointment, I started pulling other novellas and short novels off the shelves, with a vague question in my head: could I read one of these a day? Certainly, by the time I was done (the stack reached nineteen), I would be back in the habit of carrying a book with me and grabbing reading time in all manner of places and times.