Commute Reading

The commute to and from work every day is probably one of the most relaxing and enjoyable points of my day (and I really don't mean this sarcastically) . At home, there's always stuff to do - dishes to wash, food to cook, papers to sort, bills to pay, and, when all that is done, personal and work emails to read and respond to. All fun stuff, but it never ends. At work, again, there's never a quiet time (at least I've not experienced one yet) - there are people to call, emergencies to fix, infrastructures to build, procedures to follow, meetings to attend, projects to plan, and so on. Again, all great and exciting... but neverending.

The train, however... well really, there's not much you can do, and there's really nothing you have to do except maybe get off at the right stop. So you can... sleep. People sleep. I never sleep on public transport, unless I'm traveling from one country to another and haven't slept in 24 hours or so. You can... stare outside at the pretty landscape. Too bad the train goes underground for at least half the trip. And the pretty landscape becomes quite boring after you stare at it a few times. You can... stare at people. That too gets kind of boring and at times it's better not to look like you are available for a chat. You can... listen to music with your headphones on. This is a valid option if you have a working portable music-playing device. But this somehow still feels like wasted time. So... I went off to buy myself a book for the commute.

Now, I just want to take a minute here to talk about the nonsense that is hardcover binding. Hardcover books are big and bulky. They're uncomfortable to read in any other position than sitting at a desk. They don't bend in my bag - and given all the random stuff that is usually in there, inflexibility is not a valued attribute. Their shiny cover scratches easily, which sort of defeats the purpose of having a pretty hardcover. And the most annoying thing about them: they are released first. Kind of like a movie that is released in the cinema, and then months later, you get the DVD edition. It's the same with the poor paperbacks. Paperbacks, for some reason, are not as cool as hardcovers. Even though they are small, easy to carry, easy to read in any position, bendable and don't really get too scratched (and if they do, it's no big deal).

Anyway, back to my book-shopping: I first thought I'd get a novel, fiction of some kind. A few minutes later I realized the fiction and literature section stirred no big interest (kind of sad, I used to read and enjoy fiction), so I went to check out biographies. The fact that they are grounded in reality seems to make them a lot more appealing to me. But again, nothing terribly exciting. So I decided to accept my nerdy fate and go to the good old psychology/self-help section, there's always something intriguing there. And sure enough, I found something intriguing: Musicophilia - Oliver Sacks writes about music and the brain.

Now, really, any book about the brain is bound to catch my attention. But music and the brain, now THAT is something really cool! I think what first got me interested in this connection was my dad who asked me questions about this connection a while ago, in relation to a friend of his who is in a wheelchair. "Apparently," he said, "music therapy could help. Do you know anything about that?" I didn't. I still don't, much. But when a psych topic becomes tangible like that, it suddenly becomes really interesting. I recently found an article in the Monitor on Psychology I think, where researchers were talking about the fact that the same areas that are in charge of detecting beat in music are also in charge of motor control, and that these get activated even by just imagining a beat, you don't even have to hear it. So (and it's a bit far-fetched, but still) you can improve your neural circuitry for motor control by imagining a beat in your head. How cool is that! So anyway, Dr. Sacks does a great job in painting a brief, yet very exciting and comprehensive picture of all the ways (or many of the ways) in which music interacts with the brain. It's like shadowing a neurologist and getting to see all the exciting cases, without having to know all the medical technicalities of each condition, AND with the neurologist actually taking the time to explain the medical technicalities of each condition in human terms. Today, on the train, I had the painful realization that I passed the middle of the book. This means that my 2h/day of highly enjoyable, cognitively-engaging relaxation are going to end soon, and I will have to return to the world of staring at pretty landscapes and yawning folk.

Unless, of course, I find a new adventure to read :)