My wife bought me some new things to read for Christmas, and for the first time in about a year and a half, I found myself curling up with an old-fashioned paperback book. Ah, the thrill of the paper under my fingers, the romance of the written word wafting up like printed perfume for the soul, carrying me blissfully from page to page and…
Hmm, where did my bookmark go? Oh, there it is. I’ll just bend over and pick it up from where it… Oh dear, it’s under my seat now. That’s fine. I’ll simply get up, move the chair…
Now, where was I? I remember: the winsome susurrous of pages leafing through my tired fingers in a murmured conversation between de and light, and…hmm, my eyes aren’t what they used to be. May as well tap the screen and adjust the font size — woops, ha ha, silly me, it’s just a book. Ah, but such a book! A lovingly crafted tribute to ancient times of hand-ground inks and mysterious sigils scrawled on papyrus scrolls. What a joy it must have been to read those things.
Give me the heft of a good tome any day of the week. This is the way literature was meant to be consumed: clutching the floppy thing in one hand while applying just enough pressure on the spine to read without feeling like I’m peeking around a corner at something naughty.
Hmm, what’s that word there? I don’t recognize it, don’t know the meaning of it: f-e-a-r. I’ll just click that little word to find out…
Woops — got me again! Fool me once and all that. Easy enough, I’ll set the book down, being careful to avoid that tiny drop of coffee I’d spilled so it doesn’t form a giant brown crater across the next 15 pages. Now I’ll rush upstairs to the “bookshelf” where I keep my 8-track tapes and trusty 30 pound dictionary. By the time I’m back in my cushy chair, I’m sweating and tired and in need of a nap.
It’s tough work being American, but someone’s gotta do it.
John L. Monk 