The Secret behind the Earbuds

I’ve always had trouble when faced with time on my hands. It’s not that I don’t always have an extremely long to-do list, it’s simply that when I have an unscheduled hour or two I don’t want to squander it on cleaning out my clothes closet, organizing the mess on any of my three desks, or updating my photograph album. For the past three years, however, I have not had to worry about this as I inadvertently found myself a member of three different book groups.

Upon hearing this, people assume that I am some kind of super-reader or intellectual. On the contrary, my literary über-agenda has lead to a life of subterfuge and dubious strategies. Whenever the topic of what books we will read next is raised at any of the clubs, I sit back and try, atypically, to play no part in the discussion. Invariably, it will be my turn to say something (all groups are scrupulously democratic) and I quietly and as neutrally as possible suggest a book that I just happen to have read for another literary event. I rationalize that a second read will give me deeper understanding of the work and remind myself of what Lesley Stephenson, the father of Virginia Woolf had to say on the subject “If a book is worth reading once, it’s worth reading twice.”

Of course finding the time to REread a book is even harder than reading it for the first time. Hence my foray into the world of audio books. Thanks to the digitalization of practically everything in print and my trusty iPhone I can download almost any novel and amuse myself on long drives to and from Collingwood, in uninspiring doctor’s /dentist’s/ hospital waiting rooms or in the mind-numbing tedium of an international airport.

At first, I strictly limited auditory ‘reading’ to books that I had already read in the traditional way. This was not cheating; I was merely refreshing my memory. Inevitably, however, I found deadlines approaching more rapidly than I could handle and thus adopted what I secretly refer to as the leapfrog approach. I read as much as I can of the physical book but if I have to leave it to pursue other activities, such as earning a living or shopping for or preparing meals, I snap in the earpods and switch to the audio version; as soon as possible, I return to the paper book. Each time I switch, I ‘rewind’ a few pages and thus cover sections of the story twice.

There are many benefits to listening; I find out how to pronounce strange names or words; I have the benefit of another person’s emphasis, accent, and interpretation; I can smugly criticize all of the above if they don’t reach my standards. At first, I found that I didn’t pay enough attention to what I was listening to so didn’t have an in-depth understanding of the material; now I am happy to say that my auditory skills and concentration have progressed to the point where I can’t remember which sections of a book I read the old fashioned way and which ones I heard through my iPhone.

I also feel right at home as I travel on the TTC or walk along the street, my trendy white earbud cords dangling from my ears. I exchange knowing glances with teenagers bopping along to their hip-hop beats and flash a sphinx-like smile to people of my own generation who raise a quizzical eyebrow wondering what on earth this super-cool grandma could be listening to.