What is it about reading a book?

What is it about reading a book in a bookstore that makes it so much more captivating?
I dare not buy one lest I take it home and set it on my night stand with the piles of others waiting to be finished. Sure they’re attended to occasionally, but usually as I’m falling asleep or distracted. But I can think of few indoor stationary activities that revive my soul and inspire my spirit more than ingesting the contents of a bookstore.

I turn first to magazines to warm up my page-flipping fingers and truth-searching eyes. Then meandering for deeper longer-lasting meaning, I wander to the book rows. I settle down on a sofa chair with a stack in my lap. I can sit for hours, absorbed as I sink into the chair and deeper into a good volume. I typically trust myself to take nonfiction works off the shelves. It’s what I find closest, most applicable to my life. But perhaps I don’t stay long enough. I let my eyes skip over pages trying to find the truth in short snippets or snapshots.

Regardless, I’ve come to a connection with the author, this world, and find a place that reflects an otherworld where time goes by unnoticed, where forever isn’t long enough.