Since I began listening three years in the past, audiobooks have develop into one among my absolute favourite methods to learn. However they’ve additionally modified my studying habits and improved my life in ways in which I by no means anticipated. One of many coolest issues I’ve observed lately is that, over the previous three years, I’ve constructed up an audiobook map—reminiscences of the books I’ve listened to overlaid with the place I listened to them.
I stay on a small island with my canine, and I typically hearken to books whereas I’m strolling her. I additionally backyard for a residing, which implies I spent most of my days alone, tending to greens and flowers. Gardening and strolling are each excellent actions for listening to books, and so, particularly in the summertime, I spend plenty of time studying whereas traipsing across the island. As a result of I go to the identical gardens each week, and since I typically go on the identical walks again and again, these locations at the moment are layered with my reminiscences of books.
There’s an exquisite stroll I typically take that winds by way of the woods, alongside a pond, and thru open scrub all the way down to the seaside. Each time I stroll there I bear in mind the windy afternoon I walked by way of the brown February grass, listening to Simply Mercy by Bryan Stevenson. I may even bear in mind the particular chapter I used to be studying on that stroll, a harrowing account of Stevenson’s work with youngsters on demise row. On high of that reminiscence is my reminiscence of listening to Austin Channing Brown’s incredible essay assortment about religion, race and gender: I’m Nonetheless Right here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness. Channing’s clear and heartfelt narration of these highly effective essays is now part of that panorama.
There’s one other stroll I typically take, one which winds by way of a pine grove out on the moors. One fall afternoon, my canine had run off chasing a rabbit by way of the comb, and I finished below a large pine tree, ready for her to return again, listening to the top of The Raven King by Maggie Stiefvater. It was the second time I’d listened to that e book, and I completed it in that pine grove earlier than my canine got here bounding again. Now, at any time when I stroll there, I at all times hear the echoes of that e book, and bear in mind how full and unhappy I felt once I completed it.
The gardens I work in are equally layered with reminiscences of books. Once I stroll right into a backyard, the final e book I listened to whereas working there’s typically the very first thing I take into consideration. One in every of my favourite gardens is tucked away behind a line of tupelo timber, and each time I’m there, I bear in mind the eerie and exquisite descriptions of a future sunken Bangkok in Bangkok Wakes to Rain by Pitchaya Sudbanthad. That backyard additionally at all times jogs my memory of recent herbs and frying onions, as a result of it’s the place I listened to With the Fireplace on Excessive by Elizabeth Acevedo—particularly the half the place the principle character goes on a weeklong journey to Spain together with her culinary arts class. In one other backyard, I as soon as spent a wet afternoon mulching a mattress of blueberries whereas listening to the emotional ending of I’ll Give You the Solar by Jandy Nelson, and now I consider that e book and people fantastically flawed characters each time I stroll previous these blueberries.
Typically my reminiscences of books and locations even work together with one another. I listened to I Want You All of the Greatest by Mason Deaver in the identical backyard the place I listened to Sapiens by Noah Yuval Harari. I Want You All of the Greatest is a YA novel I adored a couple of nonbinary teenager determining who they’re, popping out, and falling in love. The chapter of Sapiens I listened to in that backyard was a deeply irritating exploration of the position of gender in human cultures—an exploration that utterly ignored the existence of transgender individuals. Each of these books—one I liked and one which I discovered alienating and transphobic—at the moment are caught up in that exact backyard.
I might go on endlessly, overlaying my studying life on high of the particular bodily locations the place I spend my days. There’s one thing comforting and grounding about the best way these reminiscences pop up. It’s a concrete reminder of how deeply audiobooks are woven into my life. It’s additionally an illustration of how listening to audiobooks whereas strolling and gardening cements books in my mind in methods I by no means anticipated. I affiliate books with locations, and thus, I’m reminded of these books once I’m in these locations. I bear in mind particulars about books that I’m certain I’d have in any other case forgotten, as a result of I’m not simply remembering the e book, but in addition the best way the sunshine filtered by way of the pine branches, or the scent of tomatoes on my fingers.
Discovering new methods to expertise books is one among my favourite issues about studying. I had no concept, once I listened to my first audiobook, that I used to be beginning the start of a complete new map. Listening to audiobooks hasn’t solely modified the best way I learn, but in addition the best way I relate to my panorama. It’s a apply that deepens each my sense of the place I’m, and my understanding and reminiscence of books. What a present.
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