Shhh! I am reading.

I am off school for the summer, so I am getting a chance to enjoy some novels and non-fiction books that have lingered on my shelf. Often while I was studying over the last few months I would glance longingly at them and wished I could curl up with a good book. Not that “Understanding Pathophysiology” isn’t a good book, but it isn’t exactly a gripping read or a light diversion.

I am also working for the summer, so my books are going with me to work to be read during my breaks. Strangely enough, some of my coworkers look at a person reading a book and think it is no big deal if they want to interrupt to gossip.

Can’t you see I am reading, here?

I have been a lot quieter than usual. I crave the silence of just sitting and reading a book. I am not too interested in the TV, and talking to anyone who is not a close friend is just not appealing to me. I don’t want to have to explain myself right now. I just want the fit of hand in glove that comes with my old, treasured friendships. They know I am going through hell, and they let me choose to not talk about it if I want. But I also know that if I suddenly fall apart and start crying they will be on me in a moment with comforting hands and murmured words that have the magical effect of keeping me from flying right out of my skin.

Least of which do I want to put down my book to talk about who is dating who in Hollywood, or weigh in on who should get poor doomed Michael Jackson’s children. Maybe it is the way my life is rolling out these days, but I just don’t have any patience for trivial prattle like that. Not without a full complement of cocktails, anyway.

I know that the majority of the people I work with don’t need to hear about the very serious business that my life has become, although a few of them do want to hear about it for schadenfreude purposes. And it isn’t their job to give a flying fig about me, but it is so much nicer when somebody does. I just don’t expect my coworkers to invest like that.

I just want to read a book. Shhh…