I want to read. Instead I scroll.

Losing another evening to absolutely nothing at all

“When do you read?” It’s a question I have asked for years. I’ll ask anyone and everyone. I’ll ask ‘when do you read’ before ‘what do you read.’ I’m less interested in the subject and more in how you squeeze it into your day.

My father reads every night before going to sleep, Jon believes the only way to travel is with a book, my sister hides from her children to read and Sadie who does my nails goes to bed at 8PM to get a couple of hours in before she goes to sleep.

The reason I’m fascinated by when, where and how people read is because it’s a habit I’ve never managed to stick to. It always seems such a luxury, something to do when things calm down, when I have more time then I’ll read but for now it’s back to the washing.

I love reading. Whenever I’m reading I think ‘wow reading is AMAZING. Why don’t I do this all the time?!” And I love having read. A solid satisfaction of having done it, achieved something. I read. I’m a reader. And quite smug about it.

So why don’t I do it? First of all, I have a strange underlying fear of failure, of somehow getting it wrong. This could be choosing the “wrong” book, something too easy or not highbrow enough. Or I could waste time by getting half way through something only to realise I hate it. Or, perhaps worst of all, I could read a book far too slowly.

When I was 10 I read Matilda, the Roald Dahl classic. I had probably only been reading for a couple of weeks but it felt like months had passed. I started to fear I would never finish it and I became genuinely worried that I might still be reading it on my wedding night and would have to explain to my new husband why I still hadn’t finished reading Matilda.

The fear of being a slow reader was not helped by sponsored reading competitions at school. You were sponsored for how many books you could read in a certain timeframe. Other children seemed to rip through more titles than would fit on the sponsorship form whilst I was still half way through one Judy Blume. I think one year I gave up completely and told everyone they could keep their sponsorship money. I can see the theory behind the sponsored book-a-thon to encourage children to read, great, but as we know the quickest way to zap any pleasure out of anything is to make it a competition. Except if you’re sporty which as you may realise, I am not.

The final thing to confirm my fears was the poem, Slow Reader by Allan Ahlberg from the collection Please Mrs Butler. The book is a stone cold poetry classic (see Dog in the Playground) but something about Slow Reader seemed to touch a nerve. I still struggle to read it now.

look at all those books I HAVEN’T read

But all this happened a long time ago. I haven’t been at school for almost 25 years. I’m an adult, I can read what I like, at any pace I like. So what’s the issue? Well there’s the babies, the cooking and the part time job of washing but also there’s my love of writing. When I’m not keeping myself and everyone else alive and dressed, I want to write. I sneak off to write.

As my friend

Laura Jane Williams

says, “if you don’t read, you have no business writing.” And it’s true. Here I am banging on about the virtues of Substack. That’s it’s so cosy and gentle and lovely but am I reading other people’s work? Sometimes, occasionally. But not enough. And that’s how we improve isn’t it, that’s where inspiration strikes.

This week Elliot moved into his own room and cot after 7 months of co sleeping with me. It was time but it didn’t stop me sobbing after I put him down. Now though, I have a new bedtime routine. One that doesn’t involve tiptoeing into a dark room and sneaking into bed anymore. I can now put lights on which does lend itself very well to reading but as of yet not a page has been turned.

We all eat dinner together at about 6:30. Bath is at 7ish, teeth, milk, PJs takes us to gone 7:30, then I put Elliot down while Jon reads to the other two. He stays in their room until they’re asleep (so Nancy can’t make a break for it) and I come down downstairs to watch MAFS on my laptop and clear up the kitchen.

Then it’s 9PM. And here we reach the crossroads of the evening. I’m tired but not quite ready to just go to bed. I need a minute. A decompression. I could have a bath. I could journal, tint my eyebrows, do any of those things I think about doing when the babies are in bed. I could GO TO BED AND READ.

Or I could doom scroll memes on my phone. I could think, “ooh just one more” as I scroll down, looking for something, anything too look at. I could fry my little brains looking at strangers on the internet doing things. Some of them are very funny but not enough to suddenly look up and realise it’s 10:45. I hate myself and crawl into bed after a very lacklustre skincare routine.

And here dear reader, we have our problem. I want control. I have spent the whole day doing what it required of me, sticking to the schedule and now, I want something that’s just for me. My time, all mine! And the phone is just too easy. Like a sugar addict trying to find her next fix, I am scrolling to get a hit of dopamine. Hoping the next one will satisfy. But it’s the cheapest dopamine there is. It leaves me itchy and tired and feeling a bit sick. Like eating too much party food. And so, like my sugar addiction, it has got to change. One evening at a time, starting tonight.