Ten Things Getting in the Way of Reading Currently

I'm linking up with That Artsy Reader Girl for another Top Ten Tuesday.

This week is a freebie. The topic of "things currently getting in the way of reading" was something I saw on another TTT freebie a while back, so I wanted to borrow it for today. I suppose this framing is rather negative, but it's a way of tying it into the central topic of reading. Since y'all really only know me as a reader, this is a chance to give you a glimpse into everything I'm doing when I'm not reading!

1. Parenting
I have 50% custody of my two kids, so on the weeks they're with me, my focus outside of work is entirely on them. I will usually listen to snippets of an audiobook while getting ready for bed and will read a few pages of a print book before going to sleep, but generally if they're around, they need my full attention, so I can't have my eyes on a page or headphones in my ears.

2. Medical appointments/coordination
This is, I suppose, a subset of parenting, but my 2-year-old has a disability that requires a lot of different health care providers, and for various reasons I handle about 90% of my kids' medical appointments as well as almost all the communication/coordination between my son's many different providers. (In the car the other day my 8-year-old wanted me to name all of them and we counted 10, which doesn't include his case manager or his in-home direct support provider.) I'm grateful that he has so much support, and also it requires a lot of work just to keep track of everything and make sure everyone has the relevant information.

3. Being a data analyst
I have a full-time job, which is working as a data analyst for an educational consulting non-profit. I love it — the work, the mission, the people I work with. But I have to record a minimum of 40 hours per week, which definitely cuts into my reading time! Thankfully I work from home, so I will pop in my AirPods when I take a bathroom break or go to the kitchen to grab some food, and I get through a chapter or two of my latest audiobook that way by the end of each day.

4. Owning/maintaining a home
I've been in my house for a little over a year now, and this is the first time I've owned my own home. There have been a lot of projects to do around the house, particularly in the first year, and while I can listen to books while I mindlessly weed my yard for hours, most things require concentration, strategy, and research, which mean they need my full attention.

5. Dancing
My non-reading life isn't all obligations and responsibilities! Once or twice a month I go to an event where there's line dancing and partner dancing, which I absolutely love. While most of the events include a line dance lesson, I've also been spending some of my free time watching YouTube videos to teach myself some of the other dances that come up throughout the evening. At the last event I went to, they played four different songs I knew the dances to, and it was so fun to be able to get out on the floor and join everyone!

6. Meeting new people
Between the pandemic, my divorce, and other people's life changes, a lot of my local friend group dispersed so that my support system dwindled significantly. Once my toddler was finally able to get vaccinated against COVID-19 last summer, I started cautiously venturing out to meet people IRL, via Meetup and apps and local Facebook groups. Although I'm not going to make any BFFs overnight, it's been really lovely to find other people with whom I click and start to build up those relationships.

7. Maintaining existing friendships
My energy hasn't all gone into meeting new people — I also spend a good amount of time exchanging Marco Polo videos with friends in other parts of the world, which has been a wonderful way to exchange advice and get moral support even from people who can't just drive over and babysit my kids or cook me a meal. And while a lot of my friends locally have been incredibly busy with their own kids or jobs or projects or life circumstances, I've still tried to do what I can to stay in touch, extend an invitation, or lend a helping hand.

8. Book clubs
This is definitely reading-adjacent, but the time I spend in book clubs is still time spent talking about books rather than reading them. And I'm in a lot of book clubs! There are two I've been part of for a decade, one of which I co-lead, and recently I decided to join two local queer book clubs to meet more queer people my age who also like reading. It turned out that one of those queer book clubs is actually two book clubs, with an in-person meeting and a virtual meeting each month reading completely separate books. So I'm technically in five now, which is only sustainable because the one I co-lead is every other month and I've given myself permission to pick and choose from among the other four each month. Mostly it comes down to which meetings I can make with my custody schedule and other obligations, but I'll also skip ones where it's going to be hard to get the book or I just don't want to read it for whatever reason.

9. TV shows
People who know me know that I almost never watch TV and movies, but the main exceptions to this are 1) adaptations of books and 2) Doctor Who. This past year I discovered the Disney+ adaptation of The Mysterious Benedict Society, which is one of my all-time favorite middle-grade series, and I devoured both the first and second seasons. I also loved the Netflix adaptation of Heartstopper and am very excited for the second season, and after someone reminded me of the existence of Agatha Christie's Poirot with David Suchet and Hugh Fraser (my favorite Christie audiobook narrator as I work my way through her complete works!), I've been watching those old episodes on DVDs from the library. Over the winter break I also caught up on Doctor Who, so I'm ready for the next special near the end of this year.

10. Sleep
I would love to still be back in the days of staying up until 1 a.m. to finish a good book, but given all of the above, I just can't manage that! Even on the weeks I don't have to get up early to get my kids ready for school, I try to get a full night's sleep whenever possible. A few weeks ago I stayed out past midnight with a couple of new friends from one of my Meetup groups, and boy was I feeling that for several days afterward! (Totally worth it, though.) Having a "quieter" or "drier" but still interesting book for my bedtime reading has helped me avoid the "just one more chapter" compulsion.

What makes up your life when you're not reading?

Looking back:
One year ago I was reading: Rising from Ash and The Interrupted Tale
Five years ago I was reading: Strangers in Their Own Land and The Stand
Ten years ago I was reading: You Can Adopt