Our Infinite Loop: A Not-So-Loopy Tack

The Astronomer, Painting by Johannes Vermeer

The Astronomer, Painting by Johannes Vermeer

 

Day 0

I started arranging our old magazine series. I placed the first magazine on the book rack; it was dated April 14, 1987. It almost threw me into the era when my parents were students. I guess they were of my age, as I am now. The year, almost a decade ago of my birth, looked a little brownish and fragile on the magazine pages. It has ink markings on some of the articles. I was looking at it. Suddenly, my phone’s messaging ringtone overlapped its own tunes. I moved back to see. I saw the red circle at the top of the messaging app and it was indicating increasing numbers 14, 17, 21... I opened the app. A new group alert it was. It called “Reading Club” and my friends’ names were blossoming out.

“Hey... it is the best one.”

“Will it be online/offline? Offline is better. With a sigh emoji”

“When we gonna start?”

Some messages popped up in microseconds.  I wrote, “Super excited!”

Day 1

After almost 10 days we could manage to begin our first ever joyous reading session. We all discussed our books. I picked Attia Hosain’s Sunlight on a Broken Column. I finished my discussion with the closing line, “Laila picked her-scattered-self up and released her mind from the cage of society’s clumsy insecurities.”

My co-readers said, “It’s an amazing story.”

“I didn’t know about Attia Hosain.”

“Please lend me the book someday.” 

Our smiling faces sensed that the first day was a success.

Day 2

After 18 days, we started off with the next meeting. Everybody clasped themselves with some books. I went with my tab. I chose The New Yorker magazine’s article, “The Most Ambitious Diary in History”, by Benjamin Anastas. I said, “You know, here’s an interesting idea peeking up... Claude Fredericks has titled his chapbook “How to read a Journal”...”

One of my friends interrupted, “Don’t get me wrong, but I think you should have chosen any book, not just a story.”

The second day was satisfactory, but it would not be marked as a success, because of me, I guess.

Day 3

This meeting was for the first month ‘celebration’ of our reading club. Everybody was talking about their readings, specifically about the books. My turn came. I said, “I picked up Timothy Ferriss’s The 4-hour Work Week. When I was listening to it, I really felt that we take up our days...”

“Wait a minute. You didn’t read?” A member moved his distressed and astonished face toward everybody in that hall.

“Well, I chose an audiobook.” I answered.

“For today, I have also preferred an audiobook.” Another voice came up.

Everybody was staring at us. It was not a successful day either, again surely because of me, but this time fortunately I had another companion.

Day 4, 5, 6...

We, some members, still could not match up to the expectations. We picked some blogs, articles, and podcasts. We saw grumpy faces, faced some sarcastic questions and left the venue early.

We often take up the reading clubs as the measurement technique to track our reading habits. It is healthy, but if we cannot satisfy our own reading needs then it can feel like an unexpected and insufferable burden. Our reading club was nearly friendly, but still some of them could not deal with the fresh yet contrasting ideas of the reading approaches. An orthodox reading approach somehow blocked their perception of emphasising the crux of reading –that is to gain knowledge. Every time, we do not need a binding copy, a pile of sticky notes, or different highlighters. The reading habit has rapidly changed and unfortunately it is not even always counted. On every swipe, we read thousands of things on the web, of course some are valuable but most of them are often overlooked. Yet we find what attracts our mind. We find them, if we wish. We can select what we exactly want to see or read.

Here I ask, does ‘reading’ only stand to appreciate a shiny portrait of a reader’s book collection? Or is it our elegantly designed minds that grasp ideas from reading? What I read and what I cultivate in my mind –both may not always create alignment if I do not decide that carefully.  I call that decision Ina*. For say, when I was organizing our family’s magazine collection, if I did not even pay attention to it then someday the collection would be rescinded like something unworthy. It would be staying like a fluffy-hollow vanity. Only my conscious effort would make it ‘living’ as it was decades ago. Authors Carla O’dell and Cindy Hubert stated in the book The New Edge in Knowledge: How Knowledge Management Is Changing the Way We Do Business, “From a practical perspective, we define knowledge as information in action. Until people take information and use it, it isn’t knowledge.”

If some books are in our hands and if we save some blogs, articles, podcasts, or videos on our phones or laptops –in any way we need our intellect and effort to harness with them. This system can never get any unconscious interruption.  It’s a not-so-loopy tack; it does not look like any complicated geometrical pattern. It’s a simple and straightforward system. It goes on like a productive loop, rather an infinite loop.

(*In Sanskrit, Ina (इन).—a. means determined or anything that is powerful.)

 

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Timeless Tinge