It’s no secret that I’ve struggled to get on board with digital and audiobooks. I’ve never been an early adopter of any technology – more because I don’t want to take the time to figure it out than any true aversion to the technology itself. But with books it’s been different.

I legitimately don’t like the new book technology. Or so I thought. Nothing beats holding, reading, and flipping the pages of an actual paper book. I like having them strewn about our home, and seeing a book on my desk or nightstand serves as a visual reminder to pick it up and read.

I love being able to pull up a favorite passage to re-read or share with a friend, and I can usually flip to things quickly because my mind remembers that it was about 2/3 of the way through the book on the left side in the middle of the page. I can’t do that with an audiobook.

And then there’s the cost. I can easily get my hands on free or very inexpensive paper books that I don’t already own, so the thought of paying $15 a month for an Audible subscription was not alluring.

Raised as an only child (In my earliest memories, my siblings were already away in college), books were some of my best friends. I had a wonderful childhood so they weren’t used to escape something bad, but books were read…just for joy.

So then why did I stop reading?

Well, my reading life started getting a little shady somewhere during the transition from single career woman to married entrepreneur with a baby, and it fell flat on its face when I shifted from stay-at-home-mom to homeschooling kids with a toddler in tow.

Now don’t get me wrong. I’ve been reading my behind off for years. But I wasn’t reading “just for joy.” I read my Bible (not that that’s not for joy but you know what I mean) and tons of parenting and homeschooling books, articles, and blogs. In that regard, I’m always reading.

But in the last 6 months or so, I started craving something more, you know?

Don’t laugh, but I really feel like it may be that I started coming out of a hormonal or sleep-deprived fog. It sounds kinda crazy, but that’s the only thing I can think of. I was nursing or pregnant from February 2009 to April 2018, with literally not a single month without either. So maybe that’s why I developed a seemingly sudden, insatiable desire to re-introduce myself to an old friend – a “just for joy” book – over the summer.

Once I realized that I was craving a good book, it took some time to figure out how to jump back into being a “just for joy” reader because…time.

No matter how much I considered it, I couldn’t figure out when I’d have time to kick back in my favorite cozy spot on our screened porch with a pretty cup of my special tea with a beautiful book in hand – like the stuff I see on Instagram.

And the truth is, that moment still hasn’t come.

Ultimately, I decided that for me, where I am in life right now, I will have to scramble, scratch, and claw to claim my reading time. And the low-hanging fruit became our time in the car.

I don’t like driving, so we don’t spend a ton of time in the car all week, but every summer I drive the kids a total of 32 hours in the car for a road trip across many states to visit grandparents. Two summers ago, I spent the trip devouring the A Delectable Education podcast starting at Episode 1 all the way through. That was seriously beyond awesome for our homeschool, but this past summer I chose Gone With the Wind – a 49 hour audiobook – as my first “just for joy” book. Go big or go home!

Once the trip was over, I was so into the book that it was easy to make room in my life to continue listening to it. When I was snuggled into my bed at night, I would grab the paper copy of the book, and lap it up with pleasure for the 4 minutes before I fell asleep, but it was the audiobook in the car that got the job done.

I picked Gone With the Wind because it fit into the historical time period we’re studying for school this year, the author lived and died here in Georgia, and there’s a lot of related history available nearby, including the Margaret Mitchell House. Also, a Harris poll found it to be the second favorite book of American readers, behind the Bible, and I’d never read it.

After finishing that (very engaging and super racist) book, I quickly went on to dual-read* Small Great Things by Jodi Picoult, Beloved by Toni Morrison, and Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. Then I read the paper version of American Slaves Tell Their Stories by Octavia V. Rogers Albert and found that I really missed having the audio version for that. Some of these were re-reads, but I found a new level of excited delight with each one. And somehow, the $15 seemed like a bargain. Amazon wins again.

So here we are. The beginning of 2019, and I know that audiobooks will play a major role in helping me get my literary groove back. It’s not what I pictured, or even what I truly prefer, but I’m thankful for the option in this season of life, and I’m curious to see what will spring forth from my “just for joy” reading this year.

*Dual-read: A term I made up 20 seconds ago to denote alternately (or concurrently?) listening to an audiobook while reading the same paper book. You’re welcome for that!

Appendix: (Can a blog post have one of those? If not, just humor me.) After making a habit of listening to books (with one earbud) in the car, I found other scraps of time to listen as well. I listen to books:

• while quietly laying in the dark waiting for a child to fall asleep,
• late at night when my eyeballs are too tired to attempt a paper copy (Yes, I usually fall asleep, but I assume that little rewind arrow in the app is there just for exhausted moms.),
• in the early AM when I’m cooking breakfast for the soon-to-be-awake posse,
• at the YMCA when I’m working out or when I’m just sitting there alone thinking that I should be working out while the kids are in childcare,
• in the grocery store when the kids aren’t with me,
• and when I’m outside with the kids while they’re doing their own thing.