Beautiful Old Broads browse the aisles

Dear Ones,

Have you ever gone into the book store or (remember the record stores?) to buy a particular title only to exit store with an entirely different title in hand?  Of course you have.  We do it all the time.  It’s called browsing.  Spending an aimless hour or two at the library or bookstore where you probably will stumble on a gem of a book that isn’t on your To Read list but you gotta have it for it looks so interesting.

 Happened to me a few years back when I stumbled on one of my all time favorite reads.  I was standing in the library aisle when this book literally fell off the shelf.  When I bent to retrieve it from the floor, the title gave me pause.  “Learning To Fall”.  Could I possibly ignore a sign like this?  I checked the book out, went home and after reading two chapters, proceeded to order the book from Barnes and Noble.  The book sits by my bedside and is worn from reading and re-reading. I found this while browsing. I would never have looked in particular for this book on Amazon or Kindle or Google.   

Not to say I don’t use these tools.  I do.  But mostly, I ignore their Preference Engines that automatically generate computerized lists of ‘my favorites’.  So far I have never bought a “book you might enjoy”.  Thank you very much but I’ll decide, not Amazon, what books I want on my Kindle.  Yes, I admit that shopping for a book on my Kindle is a great timesaver and I delight in downloading it in seconds, yet when I have time I much prefer to wander the library or bookstore shelves and browse. 

And then there is Netflix.  Streaming is the latest and again I love the convenience but gosh, I remember going to our neighborhood video store on Friday evening and strolling up and down the aisle.  Often I’d bump into a neighbor and we’d start chatting about movies and before you could be kind…rewind, I’d have a movie to watch.  Now Netflix likes to show me my favorites.  They aren’t.  For instance, I entered the actress Helen Mirren in the search space but the movie I wanted wasn’t available to stream.  Never fear though, Netflix had a zillion other choices for me.  Mostly to do with the royal family.  Don’t they know I’m a little Irish girl who isn’t keen on the royals?  Erin Go Bragh!

For me, I will continue to browse whenever possible for I don’t see it as frittering time.  I see it as exposure to a wide world of music and reading and movies and art.  An opportunity to broaden my knowledge albeit it a fact that today, a wide portion of Americans prefer pushing a button to browsing.   Don’t know why.  Search me?  

                        “No two persons ever read the same book.”