During my twenties I half-feared my love of reading. Some weeks I would dive deep into a book. Elation on Monday without the guilt. I could still write the rest of the week. Plus as a writer you were supposed to take days off to read. Get inspired.

With each passing day I'd become less assured in my excuse that I was strategically reading to improve my writing. By the abrupt arrival of Friday afternoon I'd get bit by the weekend bug. Then suddenly I would no longer be that into reading the book I had spent the whole week infatuated with. All of the sudden it felt boring compared to whatever could be out there. The afternoon sun -- and it was often sunny -- I'd begin wondering who was around. What bars were they going to.

There was always somebody down to drink. In

high school

the scariest thing was to eat lunch by yourself, or in a table full of dweebs. Then once you got into college you were terrified about having to walk to a party alone... or in a group full of un-cool kids. But then you graduated and suddenly you no longer had that same fear. Scroll through your phone and you would find somebody open to the idea of getting hammered.

Go to any tourist destination and you'll find people trying to give you a deal. Trying to save you money. But everybody's doing that. A lot of people will fall for it and pat themselves on the back feeling good about their special deal that the person gave them because they liked them. That's how I felt about how I socialized during my twenties. I felt good that I had friends. People who sought me out. People I could count on when I needed a drink.

And the hilarious thing is that now that I write this, I realize that nothing has changed since high school or college when I was scared about either being alone or being in the loser pack. My senses have simply become so blunted that I couldn't see that I was in a pack of losers. The aimless and uninspired urbanites always down to drink. And at the same time. I was all alone.

When I finally started working at the university call center, I started feeling less alone. You might think it's because the conversations I had with the people I was assisting... maybe they and I hit it off and we had this magical bond. But no it wasn't that. It was more the fact that I felt connected to my coworkers. Through one of them is how I would eventually find

The Red Notebook

. But let me tell you more about how I felt connected with my coworkers inside a dingy computer lab.