Life is Short . . . Read a Book!

Libraries are a problem for me. They are full of books, free books, and well, how do you resist that kind of temptation? You get a good book in your hand. You flip its pages casually, wondering if you have time to read it. Perhaps its new, and the volume has a crisp feel to it, the pages have that fresh-paper smell. You turn it over in your hand, get a feel for it, read a blurb or two from the back cover. You flip it open and read the opening paragraph. Oh, yes, that's the real test. The opening paragraph will cinch the deal. Next thing you know, you're taking another book home, a book you can't possibly find the time to read.

This is at least one version of "the good life" that I can relate to. An abundance of books. At the library. Yours. Mine. Just waiting for you. Yesterday the book in my hand was called Bound for Canaan, by Fergus M. Bordewich. Subtitled, "The Underground Railrad and the War for the Soul of America." Mmmm, I've always wanted to read about that. Here's the opening paragraph:

The year is 1844 or 1845. The night air is acrid, as it always is in Madison, Indiana, with the smell of the slaughterhouses and tanneries that line the north shore of the Ohio River. It is almost ten o'clock, and in this era before electricity, the night is profound.

That's it! A historian with a flair for story-telling! I'm bringing this one home. No, I haven't got time, but nevermind that. Life is short. Read a book.