Reading Deprivation Week Check-In #1

It is Day 3 of my deprivation, and I was just this minute blown away to notice that it's almost 9:00 in the evening. I haven't even considered supper yet.

I've been up since 5:00 a.m., which is definitely not my norm. (Six-thirty girl here.) But at 3:20, the newspaper carrier hurled the Seattle Times so hard at my front door that I half-expected to find the paper inside. I shut my eyes back down only to get a pointy dog nose to the face 10 minutes later. The pup replied in the affirmative when asked "Do you need to go outside?", so out into the rain we both went and into the swampy yard, she went . . . and went. Safely back in beds after wiping feet, drying faces, and rearranging blankets, we two girls drifted back into dreamland. But then, at 4:55, a shaving mirror spontaneously un-suctioned itself from the shower wall and crashed onto the bathroom floor, effectively ending the night for good.

After that early start I just explained in way too much detail, what blows me away about the nine o'clock hour-ness of the moment is how super fast this day flew past me.

Day 1 of Reading Deprivation Week did no such thing. That was a long one. I experienced a generalized (yet sometimes quite specific) antsy feeling from morning to night. I mean, I could see the new book I'd just started on my nightstand, my stack of magazines on the coffee table, my piles of research on top of/under my desk, my two waiting Netflix mailers on the banister, and the portal to the World Wide Web every time I looked at my computer screen.

I was aware all day that I'd committed to the deprivation process, but all day it seemed like every single idea I had for what to do next involved reading or watching or consuming. Those ideas flowed. Now — in case you were wondering — this week is NOT about not getting work done. It's not about zero reading. It IS, however, about sticking to the necessities. So on that day, especially, I had to constantly ask myself, Do I need to do this to further my work/successfully live my life today, or this week? Because, wow, were my peepers eager to land on some text (familiar shampoo bottles and nutritional information, anyone?). And, boy, was my trigger finger ever clicky. Click on, click off. Click, click, click — click it Off, click a little more.

Day 2 was easier than Day 1 but had its own standout moments of forgetfulness. Such as my suddenly wondering, Hmm, what's a better-for-this-sentence synonym for imploring? — and then soon realizing that I'd just spent several extra, unnecessary, low-quality minutes searching the online thesaurus.

Or here's one: After knocking off a little earlier than usual for the workday (perhaps because I got more done?), I plopped down in front of the TV — without thinking it through — and thought, Ooh, I never watch television at this hour! This would be a great time to watch that On Demand show from last week . . . no, wait a minute — STOP!!

But like I said, Day 3 has gone fast for me, and that's because a sense of freedom finally set in. I've stayed busy and productive and experienced the added bonuses of constantly bursting into song (I think I did that just once on Day 1 and only a couple of times yesterday), coming up with yummy thrown-together meals, busting out my happy walker's grin even in the ridiculously wet rain, and jotting down and starting to implement the steady stream of ideas shooting out of my brain and onto the pages of my WIP (yippee!) . . .

Four more days to go. That I will continue being tested (and may occasionally slip up) is a given. But now that I'm practically halfway through the week, all I want to do is slow down time to make sure I don't miss a tickety-tockety minute of it.