KristyWes

Bookish

Lately I've been feeling faint twinges of floopiness (technical term), a bit "off" and out-of-sorts and disorderly. I'm beginning to suspect an acute reading deficiency is to blame. I can't even tell you the last book I read in entirety. Oh, that makes me very sad to admit.

For the past several years I've maintained a strict reading diet, whereby I planned my book meals in advance (kinda like, "In March & April, I will read The Count of Monte Cristo, the fifth Harry Potter, Blue Like Jazz, and one (1) Graham Greene book.") I do not allow myself to deviate from the menu, and I must finish everything on my plate. Having a strict book schedule is very helpful for me because, as I've said before, I tend to not finish things. When I don't have a reading plan in place, when left to my own INFP devices, I bop around between 3 or 4 books simultaneously and never make it to the last page of any of them.

Since September, however, I've fallen off the book regimen wagon. I traded my "To Read" list of novels for a stack of required text books, and it hasn't been a 100% happy exchange. As I mentioned above, I feel a bit out-of-sorts & directionless, as though my progress as a person, a cultural-digester, an imagine-r, and as a writer has been stunted by the lack of good books read. (Not that those text books aren't "good." They're just...different. And it's not them, it's me. And they have a great personality. Really.)

I came across this article today, entitled "How to Use Reading to Become a Better Writer." It re-stated a truth I've long ascribed to: good writers must be good readers. And it inspired me to get back on the book regimen wagon and Get Reading Again Already!

Books do a body good, and this body's been book-anemic for a bit too long.