Exploring Habits with Reading and Writing

   When I think about the best writing and or reading experience, I think of trees dancing in the background; the smooth sound of water traveling in a blind creek in the distance; a warm gentle breeze blowing while I'm sitting outside swinging from a swing out in the front porch facing the sunset far in the distance; finally the camera slowly moving away from the scene widening the panorama displaying a nice little house out in the middle of nowhere, and as I become smaller and smaller the screen fades to black. 
   Of course that's not my writing or reading experience, because my life is not a movie (although sometimes I like to think it is). No, I don't have a front porch swing or live in a small little house out in the middle of nowhere. So no, my ideal or preferred reading/writing spot does not include gentle breezes, trees dancing, nor a creek. If you think about it, as a beginner reader/writer (for the sake of this blog post I will refer to a person who is trying to pick up a book and read a beginner reader/writer, not necessarily a learner trying to decode the words) this could be discouraging. Movies constantly show people reading or being inspired to write when they are out in the country or right in the middle of nature. For a long time, I thought that was the way to read or write. Thankfully Hollywood thought of people like me, and has shown numerous times in films that the best shabby sheek writers get inspired in coffee shops in New York. Well, again, I do not live in NY so I guess reading and writing is not for me.
   Although I would love to be that girl under a tree getting lost in a book or my writing, in my setting that is not possible. So, when I fell in love with reading I was shocked to realized that I enjoyed the book and had found my self lost in the pages, right in the middle of my bed...in...my...room! Crazy, I know. It is not until I found that great book that hooked me, that I realized I didn't' need nature, or a shabby coffee shop, all I needed was my comfy bed and silence. As a young reader I loved when my mom would read to me right before bed time, when I was laying down on my bed. Why did that have to change? No, my mom does not read to me any more, but the fact that I lay down right after a nice shower in my pjs on my bed din not change. Now as an adult I have two preferred spots. One: You guessed it, my bed (we just add a lamp and a flowery scented candle or that Stress Relief candle from Bath and Body works). The second? My couch, when the whole house is empty of people and full of silence with the lights off, and yes a candle going.
   No, I don't only read at my house, when I am too stressed at work I like to read there too. Although I wish I could have my bed and/or a couch, and my candles, I have to do with what I have. When at work, I find my self in my classroom's library bean bag chair, covering my self with my Star Wars blanket, reading or writing with the lights off but an open blind to allow the natural light to come in.
   My background may change, my body position may change, even my lighting may change (when I am in a road trip), but it doesn't matter because I came to a very important realization. You may say that it is the moment in the movie where the main character finally understands what the audience have known from the beginning...

I can not use the excuse of not having "the perfect" reading/writing location. Just as long as you have a great book you will soon find yourself no longer in that place, you will find that you have left this realm and entered the book world. 

   Yes, there is a favorite spot I enjoy and prefer above all others to get lost in my reading or writing, but the truth is, that if the I am really into my book, I could be in the most unpleasant of places and still get lost and get inspired.