dog-eared.

I went and took refuge in science fiction and children's books, it was a good idea. For the first 10 pages at least; then everything went, more or less, downhill from there. But I continued reading and plowed on through a dozen books before I realized I was driving myself into a reading stupor again and only felt alive when I was flickering through the pages, and into the fictional lives of the characters I was reading.

Fiction, fiction... just fiction, I kept telling myself that after I finished one book after another. But then it was not hard to read about my life, in the brief snatches and sudden sentences that meant something or someone that hit me one way or rather hit me emotionally six ways from Sunday. Then it was non-fiction, and there were excerpts of my life there. Even when the part had a zombie in it, or a witch or an armored bear; or an eight-legged alien. I had to put the book down and stare somewhere else before I feel the pull of my memories, which would defeat the entire reason of why I started on my reading binge.

Sometimes I start reading another book entirely.

A week ago I knew there was no way that I would be able to stop reading until something stopped me and broke me down. Something to break me down into reality again. It took the last three books to finally do it and I caved in and just let myself go; I was untethered and adrift again, and hurting bad as the emotions came hurtling back and like demons were there again.

Then this morning Haruki Murakami fell out of my cabinet as I was looking for a pen. I know this is a really bad time for his stories but...