You might know the feeling: you're fully absorbed in a great listen but you're about to find yourself in a situation where hitting the pause button is probably a good idea. Instead you throw caution to the wind and indulge in that last bit even though you're in what most would consider a really strange place to listen.
As many of us have found ourselves getting creative with our listening habits in our "new normal," I wondered if my fellow Audible editors had ever listened in a particularly strange place or situation. Needless to say, their responses didn't disappoint.
Here are the most bizarre places and situations our editors have ever listened in. Can you remember yours?
Editor Rachel, The Kiss Quotient, Daycare: Sometimes it's not about where you listen, but what you're listening to. Early last year I picked up The Kiss Quotient by Helen Hoang, a really fun and flirty listen about Stella, an econometrician with Asperger's who kicks ass at her job, but doubts her abilities in love and sex. So she does what any logical person would do: she hires a professional tutor, i.e. a male escort named Michael, to teach her. While much of the story explores Stella and Michael's day-to-day problems as their romance blossoms, it's punctuated by deliciously steamy sex scenes. At the tail-end of my commute one day, I happened upon one of these wowza scenes...just as I was walking into my 4-year-old's day care to pick him up 🙈. I kept my earbuds in as my eyes widened and the elevator filled with other parents heading up to the third floor for daycare pickup. What can I say, I wasn't at a good stopping place yet!
Editor Courtney, The Art of Living, Armchair Escape: Now that the only real place
I go is from one room of my home to another, I’ve had to create new spaces for listening where they might not actually exist. For example: one recent evening as my kids were watching something garbagey on TV in the living room, I popped in my headphones, climbed into my favorite armchair, covered myself in a blanket, and tapped play
on The Art of Living by Thich Nhat Hanh. Though I was technically in the same room with my family, I was worlds away in my own, cozy self-care universe (until they interrupted my escapist reverie to petition for yet another snack).
Editor Sam, Stormlight Archive series, Eye Doctor: I have a retina thing, which isn't serious, but requires bi-annual torture sessions...errr...check-ups with a specialist to make sure it stays in check. So I have to have my pupils dilated more than I'd definitely like. In the past I've tried to scroll around on my phone while waiting for the dreaded drops to do their thing, which becomes increasingly difficult (and probably increasingly embarrassing for those around me). For my last visit, I decided to pick out a nice, immersive listen, pop in one headphone (so I could still hear when they called my name), and listen. Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Archive series made the dull time in a dark room go by so quickly, I'm almost looking forward to my next appointment. Almost.
Editor Christina, Their Eyes Were Watching God, Blood Donation: I always listen while donating blood. In fact, I would start a book while donating because I knew I wouldn’t be distracted for a full 15 – 20 minutes, and it was nice to find that time in the middle of the day. The first performance that ever calmed me down in a blood center was Ruby Dee's in Their Eyes Were Watching God; the most recent was Patti Smith's Words and Music. Both titles are now among my beloved favorites!
Editor Madeline, Wild, Hospital: It was a dreary day in early April and I thought my appendix was exploding. It had started a few hours earlier with a pain in my side that wouldn’t go away. We called a doctor who asked a few questions and then said sharply, Get to the hospital. Now.
Cut to me, strapped in a gurney and an IV in my arm, in the last place I wanted to be: a crowded ER in the height of the pandemic.
Tell me, what is a gal to do in this situation?? I went into the Wild. I had been listening to Wild by Cheryl Strayed and was about halfway through her epic journey of hiking the Pacific Crest Trail. I closed my eyes and fell into her place: hiking in dry heat with the savannah mountains behind me, falling in love with the sounds of wildlife surrounding me, and feeling the soothing water of the long-awaited river bath at the end of a long day. I figured, as I closed my eyes, that if she could get through her journey, so could I.
Editor Katie, A Short History of the Girl Next Door, ER: When I need to quiet my mind, I listen to an audiobook. The immersive experience of listening makes it easy for me to singularly focus my attention on the story, and in doing that, I can tune out (to a certain extent) the stressors around me. One night when my dad was in the ER, I pulled out my headphones and got lost in a favorite Christina Lauren story. Another time, my infant son was having surgery, and I dove in to Jared Reck’s debut A Short History of the Girl Next Door. For me, nothing can drown out the beeps, code calls, and other anxiety-inducing sounds of a hospital quite like a good book.
Editor Tricia, The Girl with all the Gifts, Zombie Filled Tunnel: When story is especially immersive, every place you listen can become a strange place. The Girl with all the Gifts is one such story. Narrator Finty Williams's performance completely transported me into this world with a 10-year-old zombie named Melanie at its center. I listened during a road trip from New Jersey to North Carolina (🧡 OBX!) and it was while driving across (and through) the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel that things got really strange. In a semi-hallucinatory state, I started to imagine that all of the people in the other cars and in the boats on the bay were actually zombies. For that one very vivid moment in time it seemed entirely possible and the Bridge Tunnel—in all of its natural and architectural beauty, both sun-drenched and dark—will forever remain a wonderfully zombie-filled landmark in my imagination.
Editor Emily, The Goldfinch, Family Movie Night: I was deep into The Goldfinch last year (I got around to it late—I know, I wasted six years of my life, don't remind me!), and the last thing I wanted to do was take my kids to the theater for a long-promised movie. But most kids’ movies are great for adults too, right? I gave this one a few minutes (I won't name names) and decided that it was no competition for the awesome book I was deep into. And that's when I discovered that a dark theater, when everyone around you is otherwise occupied, is the perfect place to sneak your headphones in and listen. Sure, it meant that I had to lie when my kids asked me about my favorite part of the movie (the beginning, obviously), but it was so worth it, and the perfect use of a lazy weekend afternoon.
