The No Facebook Day Experiment Didn’t

work, exactly. It didn’t work in the sense that I kept Facebook open all day and refreshed the homepage every ten minutes or so. I didn’t give any status updates, or upload any pictures or comment on anyone’s pictures or send anyone any banana plants or karma or sushi. But, all-in-all, it wasn’t a very successful attempt at Facebook detox. To add to my obsessive-compulsive behavior, I kept open a forum page on which people were leaving comments about a local news story concerning some teens I’ve worked with. I kept refreshing that page, too—all day. I was tempted to write in with my own comments, but my fragile sense of superiority kept me from joining the poorly-worded and spelled, nasty, and mostly ridiculous rants.

Then I remembered something: I like to read. Books.

So I got dressed, got into my car, and drove to the library. There I picked up “The Case Files of Detective Lazlo Briscoe: True Crime in Newtown 1889-1933,” by Andrea Zimmermann. Andrea is a librarian at the C.H. Booth Library. I also took out “Civil & Strange,” by Cláir Ní Aonghusa. I chose it because I liked the cover—a row of brightly colored cottages lining a European small-town street. I also borrowed “Sabriel,” by Garth Nix, recommended by the YA librarian Margaret Brown. I’ve decided to start reading some of the books that my 14-year-old creative writing students are always talking about.

My cat keeps attacking my fingers as they hit the keyboard. I think that she’s trying to tell me something.

Time to hit the books.