Trying to Read

I am reading a mystery novel. Let me rephrase that: I'm trying to read a mystery novel. It's set in feudal Japan and the leading character is a Samurai... a son of a Ronin to be exact! Yes, I love these stories!

I fondly remember how I read books when I didn't have children. There were nights when I would start a book and finish it before daybreak. What a wonderful romp. The pages being turned slowly as I rolled through my sheets in high anticipation of what inevitably ended each book session. The hours of excitement leading up to that climax. Such joyous nights have now turned into fifteen minutes of scanning the pages and skipping paragraphs just to get to the damn ending. Highly reminiscent of other fun things to do in bed which took such a dramatic turn after children.

This particular novel has been in my possession from the library for about two weeks and I've been able to read about fifty pages. It's sad, really, when I have to flip back to the beginning just to remember the character's names. What makes it even more head shakingly disappointing is that I fell asleep on two separate occasions while trying to read. It wasn't even at a boring part of the story, like meeting a new character or emphasizing the redness of a stupid painting with text, it was during a fight scene! There I found myself, jolted awake. Looking down at the library book strewn on the floor, I noticed it had closed on impact. My first thought: I lost the page I was on.

I decided to try to finish the book while my two year old son was watching tv. It usually gave me about an hour to make dinner for him, so I thought it would give me atleast twenty minutes to read. WRONG! It's amazing how often a child can need help desperately.

One would assume that if a toy fell over you could pick it up and nothing would be amiss. With a two year old if something drops/breaks there are usually seven things you have to do to fix the situation enough so you can walk away.

1) Console child.

2)Fix whatever fell/broke.

3)Console child again because the fixing is taking too long.

4)Show your work.

5)Console child because they don't believe the issue has been fixed.

6)Distract the child with another toy/activity.

7)Watch as the child ignores you and "happens" to return to the activity they were doing before they had the afore mentioned panic attack.

- Have five minutes to yourself and repeat.

Long story short.... guess what happened when I tried to read my book.