Unit 7 Prompt Response- SF reading protocols

I picked the Jo Walton article SF Reading Protocols expressly because I do not read sci-fi.  I'm the person in the article who is handed a treasured SF by a sweet, enthusiastic friend hoping to have someone to geek out over this book with, hoping that its me because I like to read...I'm the person who disappoints that friend because, even though I read a lot of books, I just can't read this genre.  I have tried and tried and tried because I have many wonderful SF readers in my life, and I am secretly envious of their devotion.  Maybe its that SF fans have innate ability to suspend their disbelief.  They have the kinds of hearts and minds that willingly embrace the improbable.  In fact, it is almost precisely like the Improbability Drive in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (the only Sci-fi I have ever read, and I don't really think it counts, does it?  Isn't that more just humor in space?  Actual SF readers should tell me!).  Reading a SF novel is knowing that whatever is coming is likely utterly absurd, and that's what makes it beautiful.  Whether its a world you would love to see because of hover cars and time travel, or something that terrifies you, there's a near guarantee that it's nothing like what is in front of you at the moment.  In a way, I wish my brain were wired this way.  It seems that to read SF is to not over think it.  Not that it doesn't requite intelligence, but there is something about it that is pure enjoyment.  How refreshing it must be to not have to sort of fixate on what something means. 

In any case, this article delighted me because it articulated something I have always known but didn't have the words for.  My SF-reading friends did seem to have not just a different skill set, but a different mind-set.  For proof, read the comments and discussions following the article.  They are AMAZING, and quite literally illustrate the precise thought process described in the article.