An Unexpected Tug

Yesterday I pulled a book from my bookshelf, The World Treasury of Physics, Astronomy, and Mathematics, edited by Timothy Ferris and Clifton Fadiman, one I found years ago at the Library Friends Book Sale and had never opened since. Throughout the day it occasionally drifted into my consciousness, which, interestingly, felt similar to how a crush develops, when someone at the periphery of your attention does something exceptional to place themself into your field of vision, and your thoughts begin to dwell upon this person’s appealing traits, such as kindness, attractiveness, attentiveness. So it was with this book, a hefty hardback with a hard science title, fluttering into my consciousness, like an image in a dream, something light that accompanied me as I walked city streets, drove my husband to the auto dealership, attended a performance of Joseph and the Multi-Colored Dream Coat. I daydreamed about its blue on black cover, the design a reproduction of something I did not recognize, a chart that included Greek letters, foreign words and names, features such as Chemischer and Elecktrisinmaschine, and curves, arcs, and lines, each falling within the quadrant of an x,y axis.

By nightfall I intentionally avoided the book. If my interest were real, it could wait one more night. Yet before preparing to go to bed, I placed it on the wide arm of my reading chair, an act similar to sliding someone’s card into the pocket of a wallet where it may languish a good while before it’s thrown out. But it’s there, in reach. Just in case.