I am not a very
balanced person. If you know me at all, you might have already come to that
conclusion for your own reasons, but what I mean is I’m not very physically
balanced.
I have the
right side of a slightly bigger and more muscular woman, and the left side of a
smaller, weaker one.
I have one foot a
half a size bigger than the other, one leg longer than the other, one arm
longer than the other and the difference in my hands has to be seen to be
believed. (I would have supplied a pic so you would believe, but unfortunately, it's impossible to take a photo of your own hands while holding the camera with your knees. Apparently your tongue cannot activate the 'take photo' icon on the touch screen. Who knew?)
Some of it can be
explained by just my right-handedness or my right-footedness (good to know for
all those times when I might plan to kick a ball). My right forearm and bicep are stronger because
of all those times I lifted the shopping, walked a dog, held a tennis racquet
(it’s true, I did, once) or carried my school bag in my right hand.
But some of it is
just a quirk of being human. There’s no other reason for the fact that in
photos my right eye is just slightly more open than the other. Freaky.
In any case, I’m
pretty sure I don’t have a case of hemihypertrophy (a congenital disorder where
one side of the body is bigger than the other), because that’s really serious
and I’ve managed to survive fine. Good word, though.
It even carries on
right to the top – I’m telling you right now that I’m firmly right-brained. Try this cool test. I sat there for ages trying to and failing to get the dancer to
turn the other way. In fact, I find it hard to believe that anyone could
possibly see her go the other way. So if you do, you must be really weird.
So I’m unbalanced.
That’s okay. But I’ve been thinking lately about our cultural obsession with
balance. We talk about it, we strive for it, we complain when we don’t have it.
But is balance
always a good thing? Is it okay to be a little bit (or a lot) out of kilter?
The reason I was
thinking about it was because I had come to the conclusion that I had an
addiction. It’s quite a nice addiction – it’s not physically reckless or
unhealthy, it’s quite good for me and, because it’s not heroin or cream buns,
it has actually garnered me quite a lot of approval over the years.
I just read a lot.
By which I mean, an awful lot. Not a balanced amount at all.
Now, I read
quality literature, of course, not rubbish, and I could argue the advantages of
a good book for the rest of the day, if you like. Other people already have - see here, for instance. And because fiction has always
been at least tangentially related to my area of study and work, I always have
had a good excuse to pick up a book. Not that I ever needed an excuse.
But because I am
using a second-hand bookshop to feed my need here in Dubai (yes, that’s House
of Prose at Dubai Garden Centre. Tell them I sent you and I might get even more
of a discount!) I am more aware of how much I’m reading each few weeks or so,
since I have to lug them back in to swap them over for more half-priced
goodies.
And it’s, frankly,
embarrassing.
Even I don’t know
how I manage to read that much. The bag of books doesn’t even include my Kindle
purchases (which is another new way of keeping track of my reading.)
When I had my
addiction met by freebies for review or borrowing from friends, it was less
obvious how serious my obsession is.
And I guess I have
to ask myself if there are better ways to use my time. Should I have a more
balanced life?
Which leads back to my first question. Is an imbalance necessarily bad?
I know the eager
athlete who gets up before dawn to hit the track or the pool would argue it is
not. Ditto the artist deeply fixated on their work. Or even the mother absorbed
in her new baby. From obsession comes greatness. Not always, but sometimes.
But what about the
day-to-day, garden-variety, not-so-great obsessions? Am I wrong to feel (just
slightly) guilty about my reading habit? I promise I get all the other big
things done first (well, most of the time). I put my book down when the kids
need me (usually with a sweet, loving, motherly smile on my face), I get dinner
cooked (oh all right, occasionally with a book in my hand that does not contain
recipes) and (back when I had a job) I didn’t read when I should have been
writing (even though – with a pile of review copies on my desk – I so easily
could have).
See how I justify
myself?
I’m sure I’m not
the only one whose guilty pleasure makes them a very unbalanced individual.
What are your obsessions and how do you fit them into your life?
