Victory.

Today, I spent six and one fourth hours at a bookstore.
I read one entire book, cover to cover, and various bits of smaller books.
I can't tell you how immensely, luxuriously satisfying it was to sit in a gray, squashed armchair in the back corner and lose myself in someone else's words.
I haven't done this in far too long.
I think I'll make it a Saturday tradition.

As I sat crumpled comfortably in the well-worn folds of fabric, wearing pajama pants and no makeup, I observed the dynamic constancy in my immediate field of vision.
Yes, I know that's a contradiction.
That's why it's so perfect.

I watched the measured flow of people around me purse their lips and run their fingers across shelves, hurrying away in brisk strides of victory after locating a hunted prize. Others took their time, stroking spines and peeling back front covers to read introductions saturated with the sanguine sweetness of paid endorsement. One man sat down between shelves, obscuring rows of titles with his back and making an obstacle of himself in the aisle when others came to search his section. I stepped over him once, experiencing an unmistakable flash of sameness in our motives.

I kept silence in my grey sanctuary, watching workers set up a stage in the clearing before my chair for a middle-school performance attended solely by proud parents with expensive videocameras. The awkward preteens attempted comedic improv, which fell flat and embarrassing beneath their clumsy feet, and the parents clapped and laughed as if paid to do so. It was heartbreakingly pathetic, with the unbounded enthusiasm of the performers adding mercilessly to their naive humiliation. All the same, it drew my attention from my intelligent, printed text like a grotesque freeway accident. I wanted nothing more than to turn my eyes away, but stared transfixed through the entire show, unable to resist the sick fascination.

Finishing my book--turning it over in my hands triumphantly, knowing that my eyes had caressed every tiny word, sifted their meanings through my prefrontal cortex, lifted the shroud from an author's intent-- became much more than a moral victory.
It's been a long time since I've won.
I needed it.