We’re now more than seven months into the pandemic, if we’re dating it from the time kids were sent home from school and the entire country shut down. (I’m discounting the creeping sense of impending doom that started in late January.) During that time – as I’ve written about a few times – I’ve been fighting my way through an on-again-off-again reading slump.

When we were first sent home, I was under no illusions that I’d magically find all kinds of reading time. Pre-pandemic, I logged more than an hour a day of reading just during my commute alone (love that public transit). I knew that any time I would gain from not having to commute would be more than offset by the demands of parenting and educating my kids during the height of the pandemic and juggling those responsibilities with work. (Unlike many attorneys, my workload did not really slow down during the pandemic. My litigation cases pretty much ground to a halt as courts closed all over the country, but I have an active counseling practice and easily filled my time with fielding questions from clients about how to manage their workforces during these unprecedented times.)

So – I didn’t expect a lot more time in my schedule, and I didn’t end up seeing an expansion in my available reading hours – if anything, it was the opposite. But I did think that I’d continue to read as enthusiastically as ever, maybe even more so. I joked to my mom, over the phone at the beginning of the pandemic: “I have a fully stocked tea cupboard and hundreds of unread books on my shelves; I’ve been training for this my entire life.” I imagined continuing my long evenings curled up with a book; cozy read-aloud sessions with the kids (time to return to Narnia!); and yawning weekend hours filled with book time instead of aquarium and museum visits. But I didn’t find myself drawn to books during that newfound (if limited) spare time. I dutifully trudged through the last of my library check-outs from Alexandria and read a few old favorites from my own shelves, but decidedly half-heartedly.

Then there was the added stress of a move. We packed up our little townhouse in June and headed one county over, to the land of cheaper rent, bigger yards and better schools. It took a few weeks, but I finally got my books set up and organized on the bookshelves (only needed my kids to go spend a month with my parents in order to free up enough time for that task – ha!). I figured that once I was unpacked, reading would become easier; having my books displayed beautifully would inspire me to resume my old habit of tearing through books.

That’s been true to an extent. Since finally getting unpacked, I’ve read steadily but not spectacularly. A solid month of reading nothing but comics in the lead-up to our move was the break I needed to look at words marching across a page again, with something approaching enthusiasm. And I have enjoyed some cozy nights curled up in my new reading space, with a candle burning and a cup of herbal tea (weeknights) or a glass of wine (weekends), marching through my own (!!!) books. But the good reading nights are sporadic; more often I find myself scrolling through Facebook or my Washington Post app, which I am powerless to resist despite knowing that too much screen time triggers headaches for me.

The other night, the completely obvious conclusion hit me, and I think I finally figured out why I am still on-again-off-again slumping, despite my lovely “reading nook” (as Steve calls the living room) and despite the fact that the pandemic isn’t exactly news anymore.

When I read, I tend to get really immersed in my book – to the extent that I basically black out everything else that is happening around me. I don’t see anything but the page, and I don’t hear my surroundings. It’s a complete out-of-body experience. (I think that’s the case for a lot of long-form readers. We’ve trained our brains to block extraneous information so we can focus on our books. It’s a nice little trick.) The same thing happens to me when I am really in the zone with work, which is why I am able to work side-by-side with Nugget’s kindergarten class and actually be productive.

But in order for my brain to do the blacking out trick thingy, I think it needs to actually feel safe. It needs to have confidence that I am physically secure, basic human needs met, in a safe space, and not about to be attacked. And with the news cycle of the past seven months – and especially the past few weeks – being what it is, I don’t think my brain feels safe enough to turn off its surroundings anymore. It is keeping some attention in reserve for the possibility, however remote, that a lion (real or metaphorical) will come charging through the front door and I will need to bolt or be gobbled up. And if your brain is busy watching for lions, it’s not going to travel to Roman Britain or Gilead, Iowa or Victorian London or any of the other places I’ve asked it to go recently. Because: lions. (Also pandemic, election, deranged lunatic with the nuclear football, SCOTUS vacancy, etc.)

This, apparently, is a relatively common phenomenon, as this article from Book Riot explains. Some readers have seen their reading explode – that’s kind of what I thought my experience would be – and others have struggled. For me, it’s certainly been up-and-down. But I think my immersive way of reading has made it more difficult for me to focus on a book, because in some way, my brain doesn’t trust itself to just turn off to the outside world right now. It’s interesting, for sure – and not surprising when I really think about it, although it was unexpected.

How is your reading life going these days? Are you slumping too? Have you seen any lions recently?