Reading Like A Child
Reading a novel is a nightmare for me. That's why I have to give up many of them after reading a portion. Spacing out my reading helps me understand and follow the book to an extent. There are novels that I have been able to finish by reading for months. I rely heavily on my subconscious mind for everything, courtesy of brain fog. If the novel is easy, I somehow finish it. If it’s difficult, I try and try and usually end up not finishing it.
Figuring out what I can read with migraine
I avoid reading anything written before 1980. The language is different and difficult to follow. I get lost in the language and can’t follow the story. This is also the case with contemporary novels which I find difficult. For example, apart from "Mignight’s Children", I found many works by Salman Rushdie difficult to follow and had to stop after a few pages. I couldn’t even finish "Midnight’s Children". It is perhaps my favourite novel to date. But following such a big story is difficult for me. Hence, I prefer small novels. This reminds me of my inability to write big novels. Till now, the maximum word count for a novel I wrote is 51,000.
Many times, I have to repeat words or sentences to understand. I misread things all the time. Quite an effort to read anything. The same goes for movies. I understand way better if I watch them in multiple parts over days.
My reading skills are judged by others
According to my well-wishers, it was not important to look into my struggles and do something about them. Instead, I should have focused on important things like getting a ton of marks in the examination and beating the hell out of my competitors. Whether I improved a good deal in my reading, skills wasn't a priority. The priority lay in scoring at least a 90 out of 100. This would have led to a further inquiry of the remaining 10, "Where’s the remainder? What happened to the 10 marks? Next time…"
Reading and migraine
Three decades spent on this planet and I am still willing to do all the things where I struggle a lot. Reading is one of them. As said by too many authors, "there is no writing without reading", how can I not read? This doesn’t mean I should force myself. When I can’t follow anything at all, I stop. I do something else. I can end up in a loony house if I start forcing myself to do things I am unable to at that moment. Well, that would be an experience to write about as well.
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