it's official, willpower is not one of my strengths...

seriously, it's not! and don't get me wrong i can be just as determined as the next person, but i seem to find plenty of 'reasons' (actually they are probably more accurately described as excuses) to justify doing whatever it is i'm trying not to do!

so i left work a wee bit early today, having done everything i needed to do and couldn't quite entertain the thought of sticking it out til 5...so i stop at Lane Cove on the way home to pick up a couple of things (mainly eggs as that's about all i had the energy to cook...) and the parking space i find is situated way past Coles (which is where i am heading) and means that I have to walk past not one, but two bookshops...

so i think 'i'll just pop in there to see if i can find that book for Sheila' - who am i kidding? am i delusional enough to think that i wouldn't have gone in anyway...i guess it's a slightly less antisocial addiction than being addicted to crack or ice, but it's an addiction all the same!

so i'm in Dymocks, and feeling right at home, madly looking for this book - problem is whilst i know exactly what it looks like, i have no idea who wrote it and no idea of it's title - kinda weird for someone who loves books as much as me, but hey maybe it's simply that i'm preoccupied with a certain someone and i find myself replaying in my head one of his texts from earlier in the day - but still, i continue madly searching for this book in the grim hope that if i look at almost every book in the shop it will make itself visible...not working!!!

imagine my surprise then when i see a new release by Suri Hustvedt - it takes me about a millisecond to grab it, turn it over and skim over the back cover - i read one of her other books (not her first) in the last year or so and it was amazing...i can honestly say that i enjoyed this book in so many ways it's hard to even articulate just how beautiful and moving it was...it definitely has a place in my all time top ten!

so before you know it, it's tucked under my arm as i continue my search for the book i actually came in to find - i'm obviously looking a bit lost as one of the sales assistants comes up and asks me if she can help...i did the best i could in describing to her what i was looking for, i confess that i know neither the title or the author, which makes her laugh...we spend a couple of minutes together looking to no avail, but of course i still don't leave the shop empty handed...

so now i'm wondering - does willpower get better or worse as we get older? and do we just find more creative excuses, or do we eventually reach a stage when we don't even bother coming up with an excuse...