After weeks (or has it been months?) of asking around, looking on-line and browsing in stores, I finally bought an e-reader!  At first I vehemently disapproved of the idea; why would I want to give up the feel and smell of a paperback?  Me, who loves to dog-ear pages instead of using bookmarks, who doesn’t just curl up with a book but who cuddles and caresses it?  The thought of buying another piece of electronic equipment, particularly one to replace what I consider to be precious and holy…well, it just never entered my mind.  Until I started hanging out in the blogosphere and meeting great authors who only publish e-books.  Until I realized how much more time/space/financially economical the whole contraption really is.

I’m not trying to get you to buy an e-reader, I just want you to be on board with my thought process.

One of the things that’s been a busy little beetle, meandering all over my brain is the thought that I don’t read for fun as much as I used to.  It’s not about finding the time, because that is something I know I can control.  The biggest hindrance for me is accessibility.  I don’t want to spend a lot of money on books, or specifically on any one book, and I’m no longer in the habit of getting down to the public library to borrow and return books.  I don’t want to invest the time in doing that.  Therefore, what I consider to be the economical pros of the e-reader plus the fact that I can actually borrow books from my library from the comfort of my reading chair, made the decision a no-brainer.

I bought the e-reader on Friday and am now in the midst of reading a wonderful independently published novel by a writer I have been following for months.  Yay!  I’m reading for fun!  This is me, doing something for ME! 

Buying the e-reader was a commitment to one of my oldest passions; one that was in danger of disappearing again.  It was an investment in joy.  Making big purchases has never been easy for me but I have learned about the costs of denying myself the pleasures that get me excited about my day.  I can’t put a dollar figure to that.

Have you checked in lately to make sure none of your passions are in danger of extinction?  If you see one standing at the edge of a cliff, how can you coax it back down and into your life?