So Many Books

I have too many books to read. Well, too many books that I'm in the process of reading. I get started on one thing and then interested in another. I could say I'm distracted, but I'd rather say I'm just interested in many things. This isn't much of a problem. I have enough bookmarks. Sometimes though, I want to minimize my life, focus on reading just one book, and get things done.

For Christmas, my wife got me two spectacular, long books. I couldn't wait to dive into them both. However, I had thirty-six pages left in a library book. This morning, I sat with a cup of tea and finished it. One down.

On my desk are two other books I'm reading. Four sit on my bedside table along with one I haven't started even though a friend lent it to me a year ago. There's a book on the dining room table I've been meaning to read and one in the living room that keeps calling my name.

Thinking of all this, I feel pressed to read them all, to be finished, to clear the decks, to be caught up. I feel the guilt of leaving things undone, of not being responsible and hard-working.

No matter what I feel, here's the simple fact: I can't finish all the books at once, today, this week, or even this month. So what's a boy to do?

This morning I knocked off thirty-six pages in short order and finished one book. Great.

But then I started one of those new books even though I had all those other books midway. I indulged myself and was glad. That book hooked me. It's gorgeous and I'm happy reading it.

Then, when I got to a good spot to stop, I turned to one of the books I had been reading, a short one I will likely finish today or tomorrow. The new book will wait. I may read more of it tonight, but for now I'm knocking off some backlog.

I'm investing in both the old and the new. To relieve the weight of all those half-read books, I knocked off one and will soon knock off another. At almost the same time, I'm indulging in new things too, balancing things.

There is always work to do, work I've chosen to begin even though I have more work than it seems I can handle. I get to these reckoning moments, when the things I've started crowd out the time I might be starting new things. The reckoning is a pause when I move from being carried along toward making my own way.

Life doesn't stop for me to catch up. Things come up and I can't skip or pass them over. However, that doesn't mean I can't attend also to the things I've begun.

Today, I noticed I'm out of balance in reading. I'm making corrections, bringing myself back toward balance while also digging into new things. I'll likely catch up on my reading backlog. I know this and I know too that I'll fall back out of balance, finding new things that interest me, more books to begin. That's fine. Better than fine, it's one more way that this life is made interesting.

I'm going to go read for a while now.