Hesitant, Hopeful

On Christmas Eve, while at HEB on Christmas Eve looking for wine to take to Melanie and Joey's, Matt proposed we start a new Christmas tradition this year. Here's how it will go. We each buy for the other a book we went them to read. Not a book we think they'll like, but one we want for them to read. It took me a while to consider it. I thought about it that night and all through Christmas before I came to the decision that I liked the idea. Because, honestly, this has the potential to be the worst idea in the history of ideas. This idea has the potential to crash, and burn, and cause an inferno of hurt feelings. Have I mentioned this was Matt's idea? Yeah, you probably got that from my reluctance to agree.

Here's the thing, I tend to be the kind of reader that wants to read what I want, when I want, and not on someone else's schedule--which made going to college an interesting exercise in tricking myself into thinking I had created the timeline for finishing a book, rather than having it dictated by the class schedule. Matt, on the other hand, tends to ignore a book he's not interested in. I'm still trying to get the man to read The Great Gatsby, for crying out loud! I also don't go anywhere near anything sad because I'm pretty sensitive and once I'm sad I can't get happy again, which means a work like, say, Frankenstien isn't high on my list, while Matt considers it an absolutely genius work of literature. I don't read a whole lot of non-fiction that doesn't pertain to my direct areas of interest (women's history and studies, things related to literature, etc.), nor do I go anywhere near political biographies, while Matt has taken a hard and fast liking to all things non-fiction. He's devoured close to everything Malcom Gladwell has written and he read I am Malala,while I have no interest whatsoever in reading about Pakistan.

So, this should be interesting. I think we'll start it this year, but we're both still thinking about what we want to get for the other to read. Maybe I'll try to talk him into it being not a Christmas tradition, but a New Year's tradition, that way Christmas won't be attached to this potentially painful new tradition. Which, I should give him credit where it's due, could turn out to be awesome. Assuming he doesn't make me start my year by being mopy about one sad story or another.