“NOT LISTENING!”: A response to, “Yes…You Can Live at this Speed.”

Ok, before Hannah alienates our entire blog readership (I think we’re up to Mom, Dad, and Aunt Margaret, now!) by making us all feel terrible about ourselves for not being able to read 3-4 at one time while simultaneously drawing connections between several overarching themes and then becoming orgasmic in the knowledge that each of our books inform the others in a way that we find it necessary to write to the authors, re-read each book, and pester our life partners to do the same. Seriously?! (Pretty sure Leonel DOES NOT like it when Hannah suggests reading two books followed by an in-depth analysis session with her about the implications of each in a larger social framework…pretty sure.)

For those of you who are still with us, thank you and do not despair!! I am on your side and I am experienced in dealing with Hannah when this happens…I simply do not listen.

“NOT LISTENING!”

To be fair that is not entirely accurate, I do listen when Hannah gets excited about the many connections she’s drawn and how reading ‘book A’ made reading ‘book B’ a completely different experience, and I admit the same thing has happened to me on occasion, but for me, reading in this manner is extremely exhausting. That’s not to say it isn’t worth it because when it happens it really is pretty spectacular, but for me it takes an amount of daily-effort that I am simply not willing to expend. So, when I say I am “not listening” I simply mean that I in no way think of myself as a less accomplished or inferior reader than Hannah, we simply have different ways of reading and different reasons for reading. So this may mean that Hannah can read, enjoy, and inter-connect 3-4 books at one time while I tried 2 this week (one audio book one reading book) to no avail. So, to those of you who read only one book at a time; you are not alone; in fact, you are in very good company!

Read on my friends!