My head is full of thoughts that are not my own. Since I could first understand words and language people have shared thoughts with me – in conversation, on the telly and radio, and most of all through writing. These thoughts are carried by words, as learning to become a researcher emphasises – plagiarism, not acknowledging the thoughts you engage with, has a moral wrongness, it’s a sin.

Some of the most powerful of these thoughts come from the books I read as a child. These were territories policed by no adult other than the author, from which I could savour and take freely what I would. They were mostly short books, short enough to be re-read endlessly, until I knew their phrases by heart. Words to shore me up when I needed them, thoughts to think about for myself.

Those were days I remember that I could concentrate. Lying down on an old piece of carpet on the grass in our back garden, or on the floor inside. On my bed or my grandparents’ sofa, a dark bottle green thing of scratchy nylon, satisfying to run a fingernail along its nubbly fabric while I read. Simply sitting and concentrating on a book now seems much harder; there is a constant white noise of words that also blots out my thoughts like a blizzard. The blast from social media, messaging notifications, email. All of it seemingly preferable than just to sit and read or let my own thoughts bubble up like a spring, as thoughts do.  Or to talk with friends – mostly now too busy – and hear what they think.

This avalanche of intrusive thoughts isn’t the viewpoint of a single person, who I could engage with and think about in my own time. It’s a concerted effort made by (mostly) men who recognise and seize its power to overwhelm, loosing bots and misinformation for their own ends. Or bombarding you with advertising hoping you succumb and hand over your money. They’ve stolen your time and attention, either way, and given you a story that suits them.

It’s not new to think about how this ever-connectedness is harming us; I doubt I’m saying anything original at all. It’s not the originality of it though that matters, I think, but needing to articulate it for myself; this is what it is for me, this is my experience. I am impatient with books that take too long – Zoulfa Katouh’s otherwise wonderful ‘As long as the lemon trees grow’ I found wishing had been edited as some of it was repetitious.* The books I read as a child gained power from concision. This book was so powerful and yet I thought it could have been more; what it said was so important I wish it had had more editing.

My frazzled attention is also not entirely the result of constant connectivity. This year started with the loss of my father-in-law a little before last Christmas, which took away all rest that we needed after losing my mother-in-law last spring. For months at my husband’s firm there were creeping death-style job losses, until in October he finally lost his. And other, smaller losses, like losing power for most of last weekend, and some larger, ongoing concerns are making me feel unfestive. There have been good things though too; my Roman army households book will be out soon, and Steve has after all found new employment relatively quickly despite a difficult job market.

Still, if my brain won’t cope with novels or Christmas just now, I can choose to read more short stories and novellas – M R James I’ve never read and have a lovely edition. Three stories in and I want to read more. I have Simon Armitage’s ‘Gawain and the Green Knight’, a secondhand folio edition that I bought last year and intended to read last December. Things that just now I can read and think about with due care, and renewed attention.