Bookmarks of the World or The Art of Knowing How to Pause
My lovely mother-in-law gave me a shirt for Christmas this year that reads, “Bookmarks are for quitters.” It’s like she knows me.
But the truth is, every now and then, there comes a moment when desperation drives you to a bookmark (this may apply to more than just our reading lives).
You find yourself in the middle of a conversation that you need to actually attend to (even though you’re secretly still thinking about the book you’re reading). A child manages to spill blueberry smoothie all over the kitchen rug that you still like. You realize that in order to be a functioning adult you might have to do certain things you can’t do while continuing to read (this doesn’t include folding laundry, cooking dinner, or washing dishes—all of those can be done while reading—reader up).
In those moments, it’s useful to know that there actually are bookmarks available. And they aren’t for quitters: they are for pausers. Pausers know that the book will still be there when they get back (or in the morning). And that is not something you want to be said about the multicolored dump in the toilet that your child really needs you to see right now.
With that said, when you pause (not quit), it’s good to remember that you have a multitude of bookmark options.
There is, of course, the ever precent moral dilemma about whether or not you will just put the book face down, crack the spine, and wallow in shame forever. We’ve all been there. We’ve all done that. We’ve all pretended that we haven’t. But we all also know that there are a myriad other bookmark options if we can just dig deep into our untapped well of creativity thereby avoiding a lifetime of guilt.
There is the legitimate bookmark (it’s a thing, I promise). If you go this route, you will feel like a real adult. It’s almost as good as owning your own step ladder or subscribing to a newspaper or having a wardrobe that doesn’t consist solely of ripped jeans and 5k T-shirts. When you use a real bookmark (one made for the sole purpose of marking your place in a book), you automatically get to put a check mark next to “adulting” on your To Do list.
Then, there are the gateway bookmarks: old receipts, random photographs, empty envelopes, unused napkins, slips of paper with unknown origins, handwritten greeting cards from people who have it way more together than the rest of us.
But if you really want to go down the black hole of bookmarks, you need to think outside of the box. Here’s a secret: anything can be a bookmark if you try hard enough.
A piece of toilet paper (ostensibly, unused). A frozen burrito wrapper (so long as you fold it right). Another book (not going to lie: this shows next level game). Your sister’s discarded shoe (check the sole first). A long suffering cat (you think I’m joking). A pinwheel (that one’s courtesy of my niece). A pair of sunglasses (this is a temporary fix as eventually you’ll need to put them back on), a pair of reading glasses (this works well as they’re available the next time you need to read).
A spoon you snagged out of the dishwasher.
A bowl of popcorn (but not a glass of lemonade—they sweat).
A pen (don’t accidentally leave the cap off—that’s a rookie mistake).
A corner of the blanket you were snuggling with.
A discarded leaf.
A hair tie.
A sock (hopefully not smelly enough to ruin the book).
A piece of jewelry (necklaces are top choice, earrings will get the job done if they aren’t studs).
An unfinished mug of coffee (but very carefully).
A banana. A remote control. Your car keys. Your cell phone. An unsuspecting child’s arm.
Because the truth is that most of us don’t have the luxury of reading a book in one sitting, and it helps to know what our pause options are. And the follow up truth is that there are a lot of other things in life that we can’t just knock out without taking a breather, things that matter more than books (gasp!). And it’s good to keep at the back of our minds that if putting a bookmark in a book is a way to pause (not quit), then there are ways to press pause in our everyday life so that we can regroup and come back to it again.
If there are creative bookmark options available when we need them, then surely we can find creative bookmarks when we need to press pause in other areas. And sometimes they will look like the creative bookmarks above: a cup of coffee, a leaf to admire, the soft back of a cat to stroke. And sometimes they are a little larger or less tangible: a hot bath at the end of the day, a piece of music, a walk in the cool evening air, a prayer whispered so that no one hears you but God.
And those pauses let you come back to whatever it was you didn’t want to quit. But you may have to look for them with fresh eyes, and they may not be what you thought they were to begin with.
And now it’s your turn. What’s the best reason you’ve ever had to pause your book with a bookmark (you ain’t no quitter) and what’s the most creative bookmark option you’ve found? And if you’re creative enough to come up with a bookmark option that’s not a bookmark, what else might you see differently if you gave it a chance? Is there a pause you’re looking for?
