Drug of Choice

I just completed a weeklong fast from reading. It wasn’t for spiritual reasons – directly – or I’d be keeping in on the D.L. I did it as an exercise for a class I am taking.

I never got the shakes, but I felt a definite pang at bedtime and the morning…and the minute the kids were in bed…and while I was waiting for anyone to do anything. The first seriously dark moment was several days in when I woke at two in the morning and realized I had insomnia and couldn’t read my way out of it.

I prayed.

Another difficult passage was when I took the kids to the library. Walking through the doors I wondered what I could possibly do while they were about their business.

I read to and talked with Eden.

And then there was that moment where I was feeling all, “This isn’t so bad…I’m keeping busy…it ain’t nuthin but a thing…” or something equally cocky and unintelligible…and then I remembered that I had two more days to go and swooned.

Several years ago I realized that I was addicted to reading. A small bell started ringing as I noticed my pattern, when Paul was on business trips, of going to the librairy, stocking up on books and devouring them within a few days. There were a couple of things going on there: I was combatting loneliness and fear. If I was reading I didn’t have to turn out the light. I knew there was something in my noticing but I really didn’t like to think about what I ought to do with it. Around that time I was talking to an acquaintance from church about something and she mentioned a weekly meeting she attended. I asked her what it was.

“Over Readers Anonymous,” she said.

I froze. Denial was over. I had no idea they had a 12 step, but if anyone was an Over Reader I knew I was.

And then I realized she had said, “Overeaters” and slowly began to breathe again.

That was a different story all together.