There’s a book on my nightstand that I’ve been attempting to read for nearly a year. I made it through the first seventy pages, and put it down one evening with every intention of picking it up again the following night.
Apparently, that night hasn’t arrived yet.
The other morning, while dusting, I picked up the book and opened it to the page where I’d stopped reading. The bookmark was still there, along with a grocery receipt dated nearly a year ago, tucked between the pages.
I had to laugh. I’ve managed to read dozens of other books since then, but there it was, still sitting on the stand, unfinished after nearly a year.
I suppose I could finish it. There’s nothing particularly wrong with the book. The writing is good, the subject is interesting enough, and I remember thinking when I bought it that it was just the sort of thing I would enjoy.
Perhaps that’s the problem. The person who bought that book a year ago isn’t quite the same person who would be reading it today.
I’ve always been a reader. As a child, I would read almost anything I could get my hands on. I didn’t require a particularly exciting subject or even a good reason to open a book. If it had pages and words, I was willing to give it a chance.
I was also the sort of child who felt obligated to finish what I’d started. Somewhere along the way, I’d gotten the idea that leaving a book unfinished was a sign of poor character, rather like leaving your vegetables on the dinner plate.
That notion stayed with me for an awfully long time.
I can remember struggling through books I didn’t particularly enjoy simply because I’d already invested several evenings in them. I’d turn the pages, glance at the number remaining, and calculate how much longer it would take before I could move on to something else.
What a peculiar way to spend an evening.
And still, I’d turn another page.
I wonder how many hours I’ve spent finishing books I didn’t enjoy, when I might have been reading something wonderful instead.
These days, I’m considerably less dutiful about the matter.
If a book hasn’t captured my attention after a reasonable number of pages, I set it aside. Sometimes I return to it months later and discover that I enjoy it after all. Other times it sits on the shelf until I finally admit that I’m never going to finish it.
And occasionally, I can’t remember why I bought it in the first place.
I have a suspicion that many readers have shelves like mine. Books purchased with enthusiasm, brought home with great expectations, and then quietly abandoned when another subject or author caught our interest.
There’s always the book we bought because everyone was talking about it. The one a friend insisted would change our lives. The enormous biography we were certain we’d enjoy during the winter months, until we discovered that the subject’s childhood occupied the first two hundred pages.
And then there are the classics.
I don’t suppose anyone likes admitting they’ve never finished a classic. Those handsome volumes, with their important titles and distinguished reputations that makes us feel slightly inadequate when we discover we’re not enjoying them.
I’ve occasionally wondered whether some people love certain books or merely love having read them.
Of course, not every difficult book deserves to be abandoned. Some require patience. A slow beginning may lead to a marvelous story, and a complicated subject can reward the reader willing to make the effort.
But I think there’s a difference between a book that challenges us and one that simply doesn’t interest us.
The older I get, the less inclined I am to spend my reading hours on books I’m not enjoying. There are far too many others I’d rather read, and I know I’ll never get around to all of them, but I love books! So I will keep giving it my best shot.
I find it rather liberating. I no longer feel the need to read what everyone else is reading. I can follow my own curiosity, wander from one subject to another, and spend an entire afternoon with an obscure old book that nobody has mentioned in fifty years.
Sometimes those turn out to be the best ones.
I also enjoy returning to books I read long ago. It’s surprising how differently a familiar story can read after twenty or thirty years. Passages I once hurried through seem more interesting now. Maybe it’s because I have more time on my hands than I did back then, and occasionally, something that impressed me years ago leaves me wondering what all the excitement was about.
The words haven’t changed, of course. I have.
Perhaps that’s true of the books we leave unfinished as well. They belong to a particular moment in our lives when a subject interested us or a story seemed worth pursuing. We can’t always expect that interest to remain unchanged.
I picked up the neglected book from my nightstand again this morning. I opened it at the bookmark and read a few pages while drinking my coffee.
I still liked the writing. I still thought the subject was worthwhile, but after about fifteen minutes, I found myself looking across the room at another book I’d recently purchased, one I was considerably more eager to begin.
So I closed the first book and this time returned it to the bookshelf.
After all, the book isn’t going anywhere. It can wait another year or so.
But I’m not making any promises.
~Deborah