“Lit” as in Literature. I’m not even sure exactly what the adolescents mean by “lit” these days, so no reference is intended. Moving on…
I finished reading two seemingly unrelated things within the past few days, both of which have led me to the same conclusion: I deserve time in my days for leisure reading, and it is worth it for me to make time for it.
Justin has been out of town for new job training Mon-Fri the last 3.5 weeks (I can’t wait for you, Saturday!!), which means my sweet kids have had no choice but to make all their demands of me. As an introvert, I usually look forward to those 30 min after Justin gets home from work when I hand off the kids so I can cook dinner in solitude. Since I knew my evenings would be lacking any semblance of solitude, I decided to allow myself full-on “me time” during the kids’ naps throughout Justin’s training. Reading books, mindlessly scrolling facebook and pinterest, working on the blog, or taking a nap myself. No chores or To Do lists unless I feel like it (or it’s absolutely necessary…looking at you, grocery planning, ye who is more difficult to focus on than cleaning type chores with kids awake).
So I pulled a paperback off my shelf: The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton. I think it was the first book I read in IB English in high school; I know it was the first book that opened my eyes to the wonders of literary analysis, ultimately resulting in my studying English language and literature in college. My primitive analytical notes from 11 years ago, immortalized in the margins of the paperback, were, as my sisters would say, “cringey” in their rudimentariness. (Did I really need to circle a sentence and write “simile!”–complete with smiley face?)
Of course, the book read differently to my married, 27-year-old self than it had to high school me. However, the fact remains that great literature forces one to think about people, times, and situations outside one’s own. In my case, this has a twofold benefit: first of all it’s a kind of escape from the stress of my day-to-day; secondly, it’s a glimpse into human nature that I might never see through my own experiences, which, hopefully somewhere deep in my mind, is expanding my capacity for empathy.
On a more practical level, I had to look up at least one word’s definition, so it was expanding my vocabulary; and keeping up with the complex syntax felt almost like solving puzzles. (Shouldn’t this be a singular verb? No, wait, the subject was plural, several phrases ago.)
The other thing I read was the entirety of my little personal travel blog I’d kept while studying in Spain. I was quite entertained by my own diction: casual, because my target audience was close family and friends; and surprisingly eloquent (IMHO), with a nice balance of info, humor, and pretty words.
I have no recollection of proofreading each Spain post six times, the way I do for this blog. It’s probably because of the aforementioned casualness of my intentions, contrasted with the fact that I paid $ to own my domain name on this website, but honestly it flowed just fine and got the point across, with only an occasional spelling typo.
But it also got me thinking… When I was in Spain, and during college in general, I was steeped in literature I read for fun or was assigned for my degree, surrounded by lit-reading and diligently-studying peers from all fields of study, and often engaged in conversations with those erudite and eloquent friends. I wrote daily for classes. I edited my friends’ writing assignments for the fun of it (and to help them out; what are English major friends for, right?). My vocab and usage were being sharpened all the time, just from constant exposure to rich vocab and complex usage!
Now.
Don’t get me wrong, my kids try to teach me new vocabulary. Ask me about “bocho” sometime. And my three-year-old especially loves to test my ability to follow never-ending sentences. (More often than not, we both forget what the subject was by the time she gets to a verb after all her explanatory–I like to assume parenthetical–side phrases. So. Many. “Because”s. At least she pauses appropriately where commas ought to be.)
But when it’s literally just the kids and me except once-a-week play dates, small talk at the grocery store, and texting—the latter of which we all know doesn’t naturally encourage exemplary grammar–well, my mind gets kind of hungry.
Because I “let” myself pursue literature during hubby-is-out-of-town naptimes, I’ve finished two whole books (the first of which inspired me to finally start my blog) in only 3 weeks, despite the unpacking and the child-wrangling I’ve been up to. I’m pretty sure I’d only managed to read one and a half books the previous nine months of 2018. So sad for a gal who enjoyed reading two extracurricular books every month while in Spain!
Moral of the story: I want to think like someone with a degree in English again, and I want to read books to help me get back there. Moreover, I believe I deserve to be able to do that! I believe that, rather than hindering my duties as Homemaker, feeding my mind will actually feed my soul and enable me to serve my family from personal abundance, instead of only giving them my last drops. Like, maybe if I get to read MY books, I can listen to preschool run-ons, or read them Go Train Go AGAIN, with more patience.
If I deserve it, you deserve it, too. Amid your babies, amid your work, amid your chores (especially grocery lists), you deserve to feed your mind with novels, memoirs and case studies, or documentaries that make your mind feel alive!
Tell me in the comments below what’s next on your reading or Mental Refresh list!
“Serve my family from personal abundance, instead of only giving them my last drops.” Yes yes yes! It’s so easy to fall into the trap of putting personal needs at the bottom of my never-ending task list. This is such a lovely way to reprioritize.