Still reading the Scottish book and reading generally like a maniac

I'm happy to report that right now reading is a priority but it's mostly not reading for pure pleasure though what I read is often exciting, enlightening and therefore pleasurable. It's work but work I like but because I have to do it at work, it's sometimes frustrating due to noise and interruptions which I can't control (and other weird things like finding our shared workplace sink full of cottage cheese yesterday and being grossed out...). What do I like about this reading? Sometimes I like it because it's difficult and I have to think really hard about what I'm reading. I write out passages and in the writing begin to understand what I've read. It's a form of drawing I've talked about before back when I was first reading D & G. I still keep that book physically close to me - is that why people save books because they're actually physically attached to them? - I know that I also did that with Joyce's Ulysses years ago and W.G. Sebald's The Rings of Saturn more recently. I love those books viscerally. I haven't found a new book other than D & G that I love like that recently but I hope to. That's part of the optimism of reading and wandering through books. I'm reading as a trigger to thinking right now. I'm surveying the field so to speak (keep in mind: In a field/I am the absence/of field./This is/always the case./Wherever I am/I am what is missing.) or I'm trying to catch up - running to get to the field. My intellectual baseball team has started the game. I'm second string, often benched but eager to play. I may be banned for being late but I like the way the lights look on the field once it starts to get dark. I have my little camera in my bag so I'll take a few shots of the light while I'm waiting. It's still very warm out and we'll get a chance to talk later...after the game.

A Round History Book?

I don't like history books the way they are traditionally presented. They're too linear and I can't see history as a timeline though it's often depicted in that way. I believe that I require something thicker and more loopy.

Or, something like an elastic band ball that builds and intertwines. Or, maybe that's not the right model because you can't see into the centre of it. Maybe the geodesic dome - something that gets proportionally stronger as it increases in size...

I'm liking the Scottish book though I keep forgetting what it's called and who wrote it (I think his surname is Herman). I've now looked it up and put in a link! I'm actually reading it and getting somewhere with it. I'm at the Union of 1707. I guess that it's too linear like all history books and I sometimes forget what happened prior to what I'm currently reading about. I also find it hard to keep track of the year that things are happening in because Herman often gives only the month and day and I have to flip back to make sure we're still in the same year. That's annoying but probably only because I have habitually never paid too much attention to years when I'm reading, likely because it involves memorization which I try to avoid generally. I wonder why? Is it fear of failure and not wanting to confront the idea that I might have a bad memory? Why do we so highly value memory anyway?

So my reading of the Scottish book is impressionistic and holistic. I don't know what I want from it - It could just dispassionate: a better understanding of the author's thesis, or it could be very emotionally charged: a confirmation of a cultural heritage/cultural value that I've been led to believe is true throughout my childhood or just a clearer understanding of where all that is coming from - both my father and brother are named for Scottish heroes so I figure I should know something about that and the potential pressure it created for them as they fashioned their identities. Or, I could just be along for the ride. There's a weird little picture on the front cover of the book that seems to show a guy in a kilt studying his shadow so I guess I'd like to know more about that...is it iconic?