Why I Print Out the Articles We Read for “Book” Club

I often wish that my brain could be organized with the same OCD-precision as my apartment. Practical thoughts about what I’m going to do each day caddy-cornered just so on the side of my mind like that vase on the mantle. Potential ideas for stories and other creative projects that will probably never amount to anything stacked on top of each other towards the back like coffee table books that are hardly, if ever, opened.

But, alas, my brain isn’t so exquisitely decorated. I can’t even tell when one thought ends and another begins, when my brain finally shuts off for the day and when it turns back on. When I wake up in the morning and lay in bed for a few moments to mentally prepare for another day of existence, I force myself to stop thinking, to stop the onslaught of thoughts that come, go, stay, fill my head as imperceptibly as my lungs fill with air. I try to stop thinking by picturing static on an old TV or a heavy blizzard—don’t ask me why these are the only images that work.

The tangled, knotted mess of my head dictates how I absorb information. It takes a lot of concentration for me to read and understand a piece of writing deeply. It’s like my eyes and head aren’t always in the same place when I’m reading. I’m able to acknowledge the words on the page, but it takes effort for me to grasp their meaning. I need ways to ground myself; a computer screen only creates more distance between my eyes and my mind.

I need to hold a book, a magazine, a newspaper in my hands to understand what I’m reading. I need to hold a text under my nose, to run my finger under a particularly complex sentence, to underline what’s meaningful and important, to make notes in the margins. I’m a tangible reader, and digital articles and books feel intangible to me. This is true even for digital content that was once a physical document but has been scanned onto a computer, which might be the basis for a different philosophical argument for another blog post.

For me, online content might as well be located in the abstract realm of my thoughts—no beginning or end, no way to pin it down and keep up with it. As long as an online article remains on my computer, it’s just a tab in a line of too many tabs.

My way of making sense of the abstract is making it tangible. I’m always trying to add physicality to thought. I get a weird sensation in my hand when I’m thinking something through. It’s an almost violent energy that I get. When I was a kid, I would shut myself in a room and pace furiously while holding a jump rope, spilling out stories or anything that was in my head. My family used to laugh because they thought I was talking to the jump rope, but I wasn’t. I needed something in my hands as I paced the room and strung words together. I needed something that I could move or shake or wring around my hands, as I worked to bring what was abstract to me into focus.

Eventually, pen and paper replaced the jump rope. I always write by hand, especially if I’m not clear on what I want to say. The flow of moving a pen across the page matches the flow of my thoughts. Typing is too choppy, too distant, too cold. I type when I’m ready to read what I’ve written, which I do as I commit each word to the abstract, intangible world (then I print it out to mark up the page with edits).

To me, both reading and writing are about figuring out how words work on a page. I can’t do that without feeling close to the words. With articles, I do a lot of highlighting and underlining, usually of sentences that are well-written or need some unpacking. I’ve always loved this image of unpacking a piece of writing like a suitcase or boxes moved from one home to another. Unpack and settle into the language of the story. I can’t settle in without holding what I’m reading.

I asked other members of “Book” Club whether they print out the articles we read, as well. No was the answer. They didn’t see the need to. They didn’t want to spend money on ink and paper. I’m a millennial—perhaps I should be better at reading on my phone or computer. It’s a trait of my generation that I haven’t acquired. I’m like my mom who needs to print out everything that occupies the digital sphere in order to read it. I’m old (school). I don’t think I’m meant to live in another time and certainly wouldn’t prefer it—the concept of there being a golden age is bullshit—but there are elements of other eras that it would be nice to keep as time marches on.

Physical reading is one of them.