Hobbies are something pretty much everyone has, whether that be a fun activity or a niche they indulge in to take a break from their busy lives. Not long ago, as part of my technical writing class, we read a particularly interesting New York Times piece on how to set aside valuable time for the things that don’t typically occupy our schedules. After reading the article, we were instructed to form small groups and discuss the effectiveness of the article’s instructions, in addition to our own hobbies. Everyone proceeded to share their interests in pottery, rock climbing, and bedazzling. It made me think about my own pastimes, which I began to realize I didn’t necessarily have.Â
I looked back on when I was younger, and how my parents would often criticize me for spending too much time in my room, often caught up in whatever adventure Harry Potter had begun, or the teenage angst of Eleanor Douglas and Park Sheridan. I wondered what had gotten in the way since then. Sure, I had become more preoccupied with schoolwork and relationships, but the article we had read emphasized this idea that, no matter what it seems like, we can always carve out more time during the day.Â
So, for the past few days, I have made a conscious effort to recognize any dead time I had during the day and note which activities I had chosen to fill that time with. Unsurprisingly, I found that most of my free time was spent chilling with my roommates while doomscrolling on TikTok (I briefly considered trying to come up with some other interesting thing I was doing, but that would be a lie) or lying in bed…doomscrolling on TikTok. At that point I realized that without reading, a longtime hobby I used to claim, I was choosing to soothe my brain with the sounds of whatever dance was trending or the glamorized images of the influencers whose life I wanted. Obviously, I knew this wasn’t productive, even though I was reluctant to admit it to myself. I needed to find something else.Â
So I went home for the weekend and rifled through my bookshelf, searching among the young adult novels I hadn’t touched in years for something I either hadn’t read or that had the cutest cover. I settled on a book by Kelly Quindlen titled “She Drives Me Crazy.” Upon beginning the book, I was immediately thrown off by the easily predictable teenage drama and interesting slang choices — which I had to remind myself I should’ve expected — but I knew that I had to start small.Â
At the height of my reading infatuation, I could easily finish a book like this in an hour or two, so I expected to have no trouble staying focused. However, I found myself subconsciously trading the book for my phone about every thirty minutes, before realizing that I was actively perpetuating the habit I was trying to kill. I realized that I struggled with reading for pleasure. The most recent pieces I had read were about the operation of the harem in the Ottoman Empire, clearly very different from what I was picking up now. Nonetheless, I told myself to set aside at least an hour every day to read something nonacademic, putting my phone in another room and sitting down somewhere with a blanket and a cup of coffee to hold me over.Â
I’ve realized how much I missed losing myself in a book, and for once not having to worry about the next due date or club meeting. I have since finished “She Drives Me Crazy” and am looking forward to revisiting the other stories I had forgotten over time.Â