Stacks of Love

I got some books out of the library today.

When I get a new stack of books out of the library, I feel compelled to take a photo of said stack, and share it with my reading friends.

I really really love to read the books, and I'm surrounded by peeps who love to read the books too.

My mom and my sisters and my friends and my cousins and my acquaintances share book titles back and forth, to and fro, hither and yon, and have the equivalent of a secret handshake when we greet eachother: instead of the old-fashioned-low-five, we ask, "What are you reading?"

My mom has been in a book club for years and loves it. She and her co-readers take turns hosting at their respective homes, eat yummy snacks and drink delish wine, and coolest of all, several of the members are mother-daughter combos.

Unfortunately for Mom -- and for us -- none of her daughters are in the group.

Sigh, I know. I can't figure out why we all live so far away from eachother either.

My oldest sister was in a book group for a long time, too. I tried it once, but it was a sober book group, and boring as dirt. It's not just my propensities, people: wine helps conversation flow. The conversation? It did not flow.

Plus, talking books can be like talking politics or religion, I've found. When one feels strongly about a book, one simply cannot believe some numbskull would be so dense and so misinformed and so unenlightened, that she or he could possibly have the audacity to feel differently than one does.

My two co-bloggers and I had ourselves a casual book club during the years Mistah and I were on the road and spent months at a time in San Diego. And no, it was not just an excuse to eat sushi and drink beer. Jacquie, Beth and I talked books. Now that's a book club I can get behind.

I don't always read every book I get out of the library. Some I wait too long to read and get yelled at to return already (i.e. I can't renew it because someone else has got it on hold). And some, I admit, I shitcan. My friend Patti once said she never finishes a book she doesn't like because it's like being in a bad conversation -- she'd never stick around to finish that -- so why put the time into a lesser book?

Mistah says he always knows when I'm reading a book I really love. Because when I'm reading a book I really love, I am focused and still and absorbed and I never look up.

When Mistah and I were on the road we read and read and read and read. When people ask us how we possibly could have put up with eachother in a tiny VW camper for 7½ years, we always answer "we read." One couldn't get away from the other bastid physically, but mentally? Oh yes.

Mistah and I had a long conversation with his Mumsie the other day about how we read in bed every night and, in a perfect world, every morning -- a delicious habit leftover from our years on the road -- and Mumsie said she never reads in bed, neither at night nor in the morning, because she can't get comfy with her pillows. I know, right? I had the same reaction. I cannot imagine not reading in bed. It's one of my favorite things in the world. When I was a kid and my friend Denise slept over, we'd end the night each reading our own book in our own parallel pink-festooned twin bed, having kicked out whatever sister was my roommate at the time.

I agree: Best. Sleepovers. Ever.

That's right. Cool kid then, cool kid now.

Now if you'll excuse me, I've got to get back to my book.