I took a brisk walk in the slush. My motto in winter is: Worse is on the way, so get out while you can.
I happened, by accident, of course, with no intention of reading, skimming, buying, perusing, and did I say buying?, to walk to a bookstore.
The bookstore coffee is awful, though, so I stopped at a coffee shop. And here’s the first sign I was losing it: I PICKED UP THE WRONG COFFEE DRINK.
It was so bad, I almost spat it out. Who, I wondered, would order coffee sickeningly sweetened with artificial syrup? I drink mine black. I take it seriously. That’s how it’s done. Halfway down the street, I threw it in the trash.
Fortunately, the atmosphere at the bookstore made me mellow. If you’re a bibliophile, it is a bit like going to an opium den, or perhaps that’s the wrong simile, since I was in my right mind–sort of–but I’m also a biblio-addict. The issue in a bookstore, as always, is: Should I buy a book? Well, I have resolved to buy no books at all in 2020. But who takes that seriously?
My goodness, there are so many books I’d love to read. There’s the new Isabel Allende. There is The Colours by Robyn Cadwallader, author of The Anchoress, which I loved. Then there is Amina Cain’s Indelicacy, the selection for a New York Times Text Book Club. I also flipped through Clare Pooley’s The Authenticity Project, because the cover told me it is very light, but it looked a little, well, sentimental.
My husband is so enthralled by my resolution he actually thinks I’ll use the library! But of course I did buy something. And I was so absorbed in it on the bus that I got off at the wrong stop.
And on the long(er) walk home, I slipped on an unshoveled sidewalk, and I caught myself talking to myself. Whining about the weather OUT LOUD in public.
Yes, I am definitely losing it.