I have to admit, I'm getting slightly down on myself for the lack of progress on my list. I'm definitely focused on a few items--namely losing 52 pounds and running a 5K, but elsewhere my progress has been a bit lackluster.
Now, the approximate 44 weeks remaining in my challenge is still a lot of time to accomplish most of these things, but I definitely am falling way behind on others, namely reading 52 books. To date, I have read a grand total of ZERO books!! (After abandoning Go, Mutants! I gave up on Born Round when Frank Bruni started getting into way too much detail about his bout with bulimia.)
The funny thing is that this reading challenge should be so easy for me!
So, I know this is totally going to out me as the complete dork I am, but from junior high all through college and beyond, my great love was reading. My personal goal was to read EVERY SINGLE BOOK EVER PUBLISHED! Even the bad ones. And, yes, I've read a lot of bad ones.
In fact, I used to buy blank white bookmarks--the kind that were meant to be decorated--and write the names of all the books I had read on them. I numbered each book mark and could fit the titles of probably 50 different books on each. I even had a special box of pens and a system for deciding what color to use to write the title!
Okay, beyond dork, I know. But the point is that I LOVED books and I LOVED to read. But in the last year I can count on one hand the number of books I have read. Actually, two fingers would do. And both books were at my parents house while we were on vacation. Their house is filled with books--on the coffee tables, on the end tables, on the nightstands. I have no question that being raised in this environment is where my love of reading was born.
The question is: When did things change for me? And the obvious answer is: When I had kids. Suddenly I was too busy, too stressed, too tired, too... TOO to do much of anything. Suddenly it was too much trouble, too much time, too much money, too... TOO to take care of myself and my needs.
But that is a big point of this challenge. Beyond what reading does for me, it's also important to my daughters. I want to sit on the couch and read. I want my daughters to see me reading, to know that I like it. I want them to like it too. I KNOW that actions speak louder, so I need to make mine speak!
That's why I am going upstairs right now to pick out a book. It may be one I've read before. That's not what's important. What's important is that I find a book I really want to read and find and show that love again.
Here I go...
(See you in a few minutes...)
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.
Shut up. I was faced with two shelves full of Faulkner, Hemingway and Twain and I panicked.
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