OyChicago blog

Seven months ago, my life changed.

Now usually when you hear someone say that, you immediately think, “They went through a tragedy!” or “They moved to a new place!” or “Something monumental occurred in their life!” But nothing tragic, or monumental, changed, or happened, to me. It was actually something quite small that changed—or rather, I acquired something small that changed—my life as I knew it.

I got an Amazon Kindle for Chanukah.

All right, while this may not sound like a huge life-changing event, let me explain my reasoning behind this. I am a huge reader. Not like a normal person who likes to read a lot. Oh no, I read way beyond the normal amount. So much that when I was younger my parents would punish me by taking away my books. So much that sometimes work, chores, even going out with friends can all take a backseat when it comes to reading. Because when I start a new book, you can bet I won’t be setting it down until I finish it. I usually stay up the whole night until I finish a book. I’m not patient enough to “save it for later” like my parents—disgruntled over how much I spend on books—want me to. I devour books like a starved human presented with a feast.

Now this can be an issue some…all right, most…of the time. Not only do I blow through my money buying the next book in a series as soon as it comes out (meaning the hardcover, thus more expensive) but also when I’m finished reading my books, where do they go?

I used to put them on my bookshelf in my room, but I ran out of space. So now I have boxes upon boxes of books going into storage. I could sell them, but I also like to reread my books over and over (so much that I can probably recite all my books by heart…remember, I did say this was not normal…). Another space problem comes from going on vacation. I once read 25 books while on a two-week vacation with my family. And most of those books were bought while on said vacation. So coming home, I had about 23 extra books to bring home. That’s like a whole other suitcase that I DIDN’T have at my disposal.

I could get books from the library, but then my issues of wanting to reread books and not being able to conveniently get more while on vacation pop up again.

Now that I’ve explained a little better, hopefully you can see how receiving an e-reader like the Amazon Kindle can change my life. Because it did.

Gone were the days that I had to drive to the bookstore to buy a hardcover book to find out “What happens next?!?” Gone were the days where I had to lug around an extra 20 pounds in my suitcase. Gone were the days when I had a bulging purse, trying to sneak a book wherever I was going.

This small, .3 inch thick, 10.2-ounce piece of plastic completely revolutionized my life.

While it solved most of my previous problems my reading-addiction presented, it did create some new ones. Like further enabling my reading-addiction.

Amazon has this neat little feature where if you want a new book, you don’t even need to go to a computer. Nope, all you have to do is flip on the Wifi on your Kindle, search through the 620,000+ books Amazon has in digital form, and click the Buy button. In a few seconds, you hold in your hands a whole new book. And just like that, your bank account loses a little bit of substance.

Since there is little effort needed to buy a new book, I sometimes forget that by clicking that little rectangular Buy button, I’m actually spending real, live cash money. I forget it’s not free. And that’s when I start racking up the expenses. And that’s when I get angry calls from my mom wondering what in the world I keep buying from Amazon everyday. And that’s when I go broke.

I guess there really is no solution to my “problem” besides quitting cold turkey—which is NEVER going to happen. All I can say is my Kindle has slowly become my most prized possession. You can have all your iPads and nooks and Alex eReaders, just leave me with my sweet and simple Kindle…and my bank account.