A Trove of Books

The pleasures in a book are manifold, everything from simply escaping into another world, discovering a trove of new words, ideas, or history, delving into characters and the twists in personality, and a dozen other diversions.  I distinctly recall the absolute wonder of my first book where I dived into “the olden days” when I opened up the covers of “The Little House in the Big Woods”.  First of all there was the charm of Garth Williams wonderful drawings.  The opening words were simple “Once upon a time, sixty years ago, a little girl lived in the Big Woods of Wisconsin, in a little gray house made of logs.”  I was 9 years old and I was hooked.

       Since then I have read more than 2,000 books and I still open up each book with a tingle of anticipation hoping to dive into something wonderful.  Certainly I am not so easy to please as I was when I was 9 but I would not describe myself as a reading snob either.  I can be as happy with a good mystery as with a historical biography or a new age psychology book as long as the writing is good.  There are few things more frustrating than reading a book where one suddenly discovers that she has been editing the last 3 pages of the book because the grammar or construction was simply too dreadful to endure.  Those books soon find a place in a deep dark corner of the basement, waiting to be sent to a garage sale.

       For many years I suffered from motion sickness and was therefore unable to read while riding in a bus but fortunately by my mid twenties I was able to overcome my sickness and could while away 40 minutes on my ride to and from work.  It’s curious to see how many more people seem to be reading these days than 30 years ago.  In those early days it was mostly women who read while on the bus, although some men did read the paper but today I would say there is an equal number of either sex reading books, often on a mobile device.   I find that rather curious and wonder why that is.  Despite these larger numbers though it is still amazing to me how many people do not read once they are out of school.  I could simply not imagine life without books and Benjamin Franklin’s invention of the lending library is one of the greatest humanitarian acts every founded.

       I’m a book addict and proud of it.