television

But it all starts with the books

I was close to tears.

It had happened twice.   The first time I sat down to watch the premiere episode of the Masterpiece Theater version of Charles Dickens’ “Little Dorrit,” I discovered it hadn’t recorded.  I was starting to panic when my daughter suggested I see if it was playing again.  Sure enough, I found it on another channel later that week and set the recorder.  But when I went to watch that recording, a different show appeared–and there were no more showing.  Twice thwarted in something I had been looking forward to, I had to struggle not to cry about a stupid TV show in front of my daughter.  What kind of example would that be for her?

It’s just . . .  my life is busy these days, which is nice, but sometimes overwhelming.  It’s so hard to find something that makes me purely and entirely happy, that doesn’t drain me or make me think of the ten thousand million other things I should be doing.   Sadly, I have so much obligatory reading these days–my daughter’s school book club, manuscripts people have asked me to blurb or review, novels my editors have suggested I read for inspiration, etc–and while much of it can be enjoyable, I still feel pressure to push through everything quickly.  And when I’m tired, sometimes I just want to stare at a screen. Read the rest of this entry »