The Thingamabobs I Need Whenever I Read
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It was sometime during my master’s program that I started writing in books. The year was 2018, and I spent my weeks running between my first media job and the dark, yellowy basement in Jamaica, Queens, that housed the St. John’s English department — reading books and papers on the F or the E and the Q46. Note-taking was a necessity, but I found the practice a bit sacrilegious. I felt I was scrawling on top of a hallowed text, but I had a lot to say to Alice Walker inThe Color Purpleand Denise Ferreira da Silva’sToward a Global Idea of Race.I would read sentences that set my brain on fire, and I needed to document that in real time. At that point I was writing on the raw page, and while it felt wrong, I could justify it in the name of academics.
After graduation, I went back to reading for fun and felt reticent about writing in my fiction books with no paper to write or notes to take. So I bought some nice-looking flags in pleasing muted tones. That was the beginning of the extras. Now I have an armful of thingamabobs whenever I read, all of which have to follow me from room to room. There are people (my wife) who will say this is another way for me to buy unnecessary stuff, and while I concede that I do like buying a little thing (I am powerless in a shoppy shop), these add-ons have genuinely improved my reading routine and made me a more careful and thoughtful reader. Annotation has been key for becoming a deeper reader and tracking my relationship with the text. Everything I use to annotate, below.
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Morandi Sticky Tabs
These are the flags that started it all. I’m a very vocal fan of these, to the point that for Strategist Secret Santa this year, my co-worker bought me a pack. They’re very popular on Bookstagram — so named for the bibliophiles who use Instagram — where people display their heavily marked up copies of books. I started using them after seeing one of many posts, and I’ve since bought them in an array of colors. I use them to mark a passage I like or a sentence I want to remember. Or sometimes when I disagree with whatever the author is saying, I’ll stick a tab on it so I can come back and silently argue.
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And when I’m feeling particularly thoughtful or argumentative, I love these Post-it notes, which are an inch smaller than the normal-size ones. They don’t take up much space on the page but are big enough for a short diatribe. I also like all the colorways, though I’m partial to the primary colors. I buy four packs at a time out of fear that one day they’ll be discontinued.
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Muji Gel Ink Ballpoint Pen, Black 0.38mm (10-Pack)
For writing on said Post-it notes (and more generally), I like the Muji 0.38-mm. pen — it’s thin and a little scratchy, but the ink gets silkier over time. The thin tip makes it easy to write a lot in a small space.
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On the rare occasion I highlight, I use the Muji highlighters, which are a little sheer. An ultrapigmented highlighter can feel a little aggressive on the page, so I like that it’s visible but not neon. I also like that the tip is clear, so I can see what’s underneath while highlighting. It ensures I limit it to just the important stuff.
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For when my thoughts extend beyond the page, I like to use a large hardcover Moleskine with gridded lines. There’s something about the boxed lines that makes my writing neater and more coherent. I’ve cycled through a few colors over the years, but right now I’m drawn to navy blue, which feels as sleek as black but a little more interesting.
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I was a big fan of theHooga book light, a Strategist staple. I loved it so much that I bought it for multiple friends and would have a conniption if I left it behind. But then I started noticing slight design flaws that soon became impossible to ignore. The light is incredibly sensitive to touch, so it was always turning on in my bag, which would lead to it dying. Another annoying thing is that I never knew how much charge it had left, so it would always die in the middle of a reading session. After I misplaced the charger, I decided to try a different Amazon brand. I opted for this one, which has 19 LEDs and creates a bar of light that illuminates both pages. It has multiple light levels and color options and tells you how much battery you have left. It’s also less sensitive, so I can toss it in my bag and not worry about it turning on. I’ve incorporated it faithfully into my routine and can’t read without it.
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