I read recently that those who read books for 30 minutes daily live nearly two years longer than nonreaders or magazine readers. This is terrifying.
As a bedtime reader, I don’t believe I’ve made it once this year beyond the 10.5 minutes it takes from the opening paragraph until the book slips from my hand and crashes to the floor. I had no idea this was shortening my life.
This is despite the fact that I’ve been fairly diligent on reader research. I’m well aware, for example, that the glow of an e-reader could interfere with my melatonin production, so I’ve sworn off bringing one to bed with me.
Besides, an electronic device could self-destruct with a sudden crash. That’s one reason I’ve taken to life-shortening magazine-reading at bedtime. Magazines fall unharmed, with barely a ripple. Give me an in-depth article on the intricacies of climate change, and I’ll give you a good five minutes of wakeful enlightenment.
The culprit, though, is really not e-reading or magazine reading but finding a book that can engage me as fervently as some binge-watch TV show with a simple plot line. I hesitate, as a one-time British lit major with well-read friends, to admit this.
I have friends who, before they watch Hamilton on stage, will have read all 832 pages of Ron Chernow’s historical account on which it is based. I preferred to let Lin-Manuel Miranda do the work of sucking out every dramatic moment of Alexander’s life and setting it to rap music. I came away not with any detailed grasp of the details but a sense – the gist, let us say – of the man’s personality and that of the other founding fathers, with a few historical milestones sandwiched in between.
While they are slogging happily through yards of historical fact, I am struggling to keep track of multiple plot lines in the novels that my book group and bibliophile friends have recently recommended. The last few selections seem to require a map, a glossary, and a family tree – all of which I would have preferred to have handed to me, but were not. It is so difficult at bedtime to bring a notebook and pen and then to get the ink out of the sheets when the pen inevitably drifts off right along with me.
My last book, which I myself selected after being enamored at the author’s reading, involved two women’s stories, occurring decades apart. I worked feverishly – even before bed – to keep track of each one, as they bounced blissfully back and forth within their own time periods. Then, probably 90% of the way through, voila! I discovered one was the mother-in-law of the other. Huh? I will not disclose the title of this book – not for fear of being a spoiler but because some clever reader will write that she had figured this out in the first 20 pages.
I am so good at self-shaming that I’m not sure I can go forward with my latest selection, chosen for a cross-country flight. Noting that a commentator promises, “It will keep you from eating, sleeping, or checking your e-mail,” I shrank. What if this book in my hands also goes crashing to the floor?
Besides, the review sounds like a comment more appropriate for “Grace and Frankie,” which I’m proud to say has kept me on the exercise bike so far for three seasons, 12 episodes apiece.
I wonder how long cycling lengthens your life?
Copyright 2019 Pat Snyder
