The life of a bookworm is hard.
Not only do we have to deal with the fact that we are, indeed, bookworms; we also have to deal with the people who aren’t.
This post is for those strange creatures that do not label themselves as such. Heed us, understand us, and we won’t have to bash you over the head with our heavy books. 📚
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1. Bag Lady
I love bags, I really do. I scroll through my fashion feeds and despair at the beautiful handbags I can’t buy because they’re JUST NOT BIG ENOUGH. The idea of fitting any book into a clutch is preposterous.
I always have at least one paperback and an eReader on my person at any point during the day (or night). This means I need a bag big enough to carry both, as well as all everything else I need – you know, purses and keys and other unimportant items.
This basically puts me in the category of bag lady for the rest of my life. I wouldn’t mind so much, if people stopped buying me beautiful bags I’ll never use.
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2. The TBR Pile
I’ve done an entire blog post on this so I won’t go into too much detail.
Suffice to say non-bookworms will blink at the reference of the TBR – it will have no other effect on them. Mentioning it to a bookworm, however, will induce nausea, excitement, and anxious twitching.
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3. Book Hangover
Ever finish a book (or trilogy) and feel empty inside? Desolate and morose, you despair at the state of life – what are you going to do or, even worse, what are you going to read next? What could possibly live up to the incredible world you’ve just left behind??
If you’ve faced these emotions, you’ve experienced book hangover.
If you haven’t, you’re not reading the right books.
Or there’s something wrong with you.
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4. Waiting for the Next Episode
Ever start reading a series and it’s the best thing you’ve experienced in your life, ever? Get to the end and BAM! Cliff hanger like you’ve never seen before. What do you do? Go straight to the bookshop and buy the sequel, duh!
But what happens if it’s not out yet??
Life ends, obviously. The soul destroying agony of having to walk back out of the shop without the next installment is unbearable. And you will need to rant about it on several occasions to numerous people before you can even begin to come to terms with it.
Not only will non-bookworms be confused by this level of extreme grief, they’ll never understand the need to re-read the entire series once the next installment does finally come out.
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5. The Book Crush
I have been told I am (currently) single because I have incredibly high expectations of men.
I can’t be blamed for these high standards, however. If you can’t be a genius, intense, devastatingly handsome, sensitive, loving, and a vampire (any form of mythical creature will do) then I’m sorry – you’re just not for me.
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6. Grief is a thing between pages
Every bookworm has a character whose death they’ll never come to terms with.
For me, it’s Dumbledore. I. Just. Can’t. Deal.
But non-bookworms don’t understand this grief. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve been told to ‘get over it’ when it comes to a character’s death in a book.
What they don’t understand is that I’ve spent the last however many days (or hours, depending on how fast I read) in said character’s head. Maybe I fell in love with them. Maybe I fought a war alongside them. I would have learnt more about that one character – who they are, why they do what they do, how they feel etc. – than I would in the same time spent with a real person.
So let me grieve, dammit!
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7. Book Buying Bans
Non-bookworms don’t understand the concept of a book buying ban. They would not leave a bookstore with more than 5 books purchased… unless they were buying a bookworm presents, then it’s totally OK!
These people won’t have stacks of book piled up like a Tetris tower because they are not addicted to purchasing books. They read whatever they have and, when they’ve finished, they’ll purchase one book to read next.
If these people are from Earth, then I’m clearly from Pluto (it’s still a planet in my eyes!). I can’t count the number of times I have enforced (and then broken) a book-buying ban. It is almost impossible for me to walk past a bookstore without going in. And it’s even harder to leave without at least one book (normally three) in my bag.
What can I say, I have overly-ambitious notions of how quickly I can read.
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8. Re-Readers
I am constantly asked why I bother re-reading a book, especially when I have so many books I haven’t read. This normally either happens just after I give an especially long rant about my TBR pile, or if I have a conversation with a non-reader (guys, they DO exist!).
My answer is simple. Why not? You wouldn’t eat your favourite meal once and say “Great, thanks. Don’t need to eat that again”. OK, that’s a rubbish comparison but, for a bookworm, it’s surprisingly accurate. We live and breathe these stories, why on earth would we not want to revisit our favourite characters/worlds/plots again (and again, and again, and again)?
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9. Book Bags
You can always tell a bookworm apart from the crowd because they’re the ones with bags under their eyes. Convinced they’ll go to sleep after one more chapter; they’ll finish the entire book in one night and wonder why they’re so tired the next day.
‘Go to bed earlier’, I’ve been told. Yeah, right. That just gives me more time to get addicted to the story.
‘Just stop where you are’, they say. These people don’t understand the concept of a chapter. IT MUST BE FINISHED.
‘Don’t read before you go to bed’, they suggest. We don’t talk to those people anymore.
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10. Book Etiquette
We follow hundreds of tiny rules each day that ensure the sanity of the world.
Stand on the right side of the escalator.
Say please and thank you.
Respect other people’s property.
In general, the majority can manage these simple rules; so why is it that, when it comes to borrowing books, we fall into chaos?
No. You may not break the spine of my beloved book.
You cannot write in it.
And you absolutely will not turn corners. THERE ARE A MILLION PIECES OF PAPER IN YOUR LIFE, USE ONE AS A BOOKMARK!
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Now you know the struggle we bookworms face, next time you see us in public, smile, say hi…
…Only kidding, give us your seat and don’t make small talk. Real people are daunting, our backs hurt from carrying all those tomes, and all we want to do get back to our book.
A Literary Mind 