“If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot.” – Stephen King
I do not read enough. Sure, I listen to audiobooks pretty much every day, but it is not the same as the physical act of reading. Well, at least not to me. Sure, it helps to stir my imagination somewhat, but…there is just something about having the book in my hands, allowing myself to become intimate with the characters, their lives, their thoughts, that really gets my imagination running in high gear, formulating the scene from the book into a picture of reality in my head. I find that fiction does this for me much better than non-fiction. Non-fiction is fact-finding, information gathering, learning.
I love to research things on the internet. This falls into my ‘love of learning’ category, and the internet is an abyss that I am prone to fall into for hours, cross referencing this or that, finding one fact that takes me to another, and, before I know it, I am nowhere near where I started, topic-wise. Somehow, one topic has led me to another, seemingly unconnected, topic. I absolutely love the internet for this one reason alone. There is nothing I can’t learn with the appropriate search term, keystroke, and/or click.
While swimming through this abyss satiates my desire for learning, it doesn’t seem to feed my imagination very well. I used to read every night before going to sleep. I can’t remember the last time I did that. My best friend pointed this out to me.
We were talking one day, recently, and she told me I really need a good book to read. I immediately agreed with her but I didn’t really put a whole lot into it. I just never seem to feel like there is room for it in my life.Time management, I guess. A couple of nights later, after watching a couple of shows on Netflix, as I was getting ready for bed, the reality of her statement settled in, seating itself as a deep need. I was overwhelmed with the desire for a good book to lose myself in.
So, today, after I finish my clean, I am headed to Half-Price Books to find myself a book or two. Tonight, instead of watching mind numbing Netflix, I will be learning a whole new world with new people and places and things, becoming familiar with them, letting my mind paint the picture and my imagination fuel the brush strokes. I can’t wait!
Dragonfly Gypsy USA 