Sarah Eaton, On Reading

"When I don’t read, I feel depressed. Reading stories on the internet doesn’t count, it has to be a book, in my hand, and I have to read every day. If you are depressed, you should try reading. I think it might be a substitute for meditation or something else healthy. My mom told me this story about how when she was a little girl she would hide in a closet to escape chores and read. My granny used to check out a huge stack of books from the library and sit on her porch and read and chain smoke. When I was small, I could read any of my family’s books that they got from the library, which was strange because I was not allowed to watch anything I wanted--like I remember desperately wanting to see Top Gun but not being allowed--but I could totally read books about hard-boiled detectives who have raunchy sex in their spare time. And so I did. I read everything. And I still do. I’m trying to teach my cats to read, to keep up the family tradition, but mostly they just sleep instead."

{Sarah Eaton's poetry book, Tough Skin (BlazeVOX Books), is available here and here.}