This is me exactly. Reading is all about escapism. In fact it was the only thing that saved me from all my childhood trauma. I had (arguably) the most trauma out of all my siblings, and all but one and me have substance abuse issues. Reading is how I got away from the unbearable. Because of that, I will avoid any book I know is about child rape or abuses of certain sorts, because they cut too close. Of course, I am sometimes surprised in a book by traumatic events, and it just varies on how badly it hits me. But I want fun reading, not trauma.

Cloudwatching.

Also, the end (and all) of “Fern Hill” by Dylan Thomas, one of my favorite poems.

“Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means, Time held me green and dying Though I sang in my chains like the sea.”

“So swimming is a rite of passage, a crossing of boundaries: the line of the shore, the bank of the river, the edge of the pool, the surface itself. When you enter the water, something like metamorphosis happens. Leaving behind the land, you go through the looking-glass surface and enter a new world, in which survival, not ambition or desire, is the dominant aim. The lifeguards at the pool or the beach remind you of the thin line between waving and drowning. You see and experience things when you’re swimming in a way that is completely different from any other. You are in nature, part and parcel of it, in a far more complete and intense way than on dry land, and your sense of the present is overwhelming.”

“Waterlog”- Roger Deakin

I’ve never been much of a swimmer, but Deakin’s evocative descriptions make me dream of the water.

I so enjoyed reading “The Dead.” You’ve brought back its aura with that quote.