Rediscovering the Rainbow...the Reading Rainbow.

Take a look, it's in a book...

When we were learning to read, it's all we wanted to do; bringing home a big stack of books from the public library was the biggest treat for baby Lucy. Then came those YA novels that coincided with puberty and we were enraptured. Then high school where we read a chapter a night for our English classes--but the fact that reading was required seemed to take the whim out of it (and the fun). College further damaged the love I had for reading as a leisure activity; it was academic, hard to get through, and indigestible pounds of it were assigned every night. So when I graduated in May and put academia on hold, I also set out on the quest to find my love of reading again. I wanted to feel that sense of child-like wonder when I picked up a book, to smell those musty pages and know that there was nothing keeping me from the richness to be had inside.

The journey is just beginning, but I'm reading more and more for happiness (the phrase, "reading for pleasure" makes me vom) as the days roll by. 

A few things have helped me on this path:

1. time: I have a fair amount of it now that I'm out of school and working. There's nothing like being able to say "I have nothing to do for the next hour but read this book."

2. a library card: As the Arthur crew said, "Having fun isn't hard, when you've got a library card!" They were right. I love browsing titles in this FREE institution that exists in many of our towns and cities. Check it out...and check some out. 

3. a journal: Since we're not required to understand the text for a class, it can be easy to wander off (not that we didn't do this when it was required for a class). I find reading with a journal at hand gives me a place to keep track of what I'm learning (especially when reading Biography or other non-fiction).

4. a comfy setting...but not too comfy: I find the hardest part about loving reading again is how much I've grown to love sleep in the past four years. I can't read in bed...cause that would be sleeping...so I've been doing a lot of it in coffee shops, on the couch (upright), and often with some coffee at hand. 

This week, I'm reading a biography of Charles Dickens by Jane Smiley. Recommended to me by my Father, I think it will be the first of many biographies I read this winter. With my work at the museum, learning everything about Emily Dickinson, I've begun to wonder if the lives of writers and artists aren't the most interesting stories to be told. 

Here's a little reading inspiration...

What have YOU been reading lately for happiness?