Reading:  A Love Story


I’m trying to remember when I first picked up a book and was able to read the words across the page, because it seems it must have been love at first sight. I never used to believe in such nonsense, even as a child reading Grimm’s Fairy Tales – especially reading those, now that I think of it. (For the most part, they had dire endings that I imagine were precursors of film noir.) Ah, but Reading! Reading has been a lifelong romance. When does life begin? Is it that first spark, that embryo of interest in the written word? Studies show that being read to is the first step toward reading independently – that the more a child is exposed to literature the more likely they are to read themselves. Likewise, if their parents have a mutually respectful, loving relationship, the easier it is for them to take that model into their adulthood.

My mother says she read to me, but I don’t remember it at all. Furthermore, she says that when she was working on her bachelor’s degree in computer programming, she used to sit at the table with me while she was doing her homework and I would sit and color as she studied. Should a test arise, I might be just as likely to hear Biology 101 for a bedtime story as Cinderella. She went into labor with the first of my younger sisters while in class taking a test. Did these efforts on my mother’s behalf foster literacy despite my second-hand memories of them? Certainly they instilled a sense of education as a priority.

The first person I remember reading to me was the librarian at the public library, and then afterward my first grade teacher Mrs. Lynch, whom I adored. She was sweet and kind and never berated me for drawing on the back of my math papers. She had a little friendly ghost puppet who made special appearances in some of the books she read to us, though I don’t recall his name. We read about Ben Franklin and his kite, which may well have been the beginning of my fascination with history. The book that stands out most firmly in my memory was the story on the origins of Smokey the Bear. A compassionate child, I was horrified to think of that poor little cub clinging to that burnt tree, his parents dead or lost in the horrifying blaze. Thus opened a vista through which I could see and hear and feel through a story.

Library day was my favorite day of the week - A tryst with the dearest love of my heart. I would slip between the bookcases and peruse the shelves, running my fingers indiscriminately along the spines of books old and young, tattered or shining, at my age level or well beyond. A title, a picture, a texture – something would catch my eye and my curiosity would not be satisfied until I could feel that book in my hands and smuggle it home with me. I would then read it from cover to cover whenever and wherever I could steal a moment to admire the pictures or taste the words upon my lips. I read Babar the Elephant, Where the Wild Things Are, Nancy Drews, Beatrix Potter, Grimm’s Fairy Tales, Hans Christian Anderson, The Red Fairy Book, the Blue one… I loved picture books for the art and the way words were matched to the page and stacked to create fun or suspense, but equally loved the more complicated plots of stories written long ago.

I don’t know when I crossed over from children’s literature to Juvenile Fiction. It was like I’d tentatively kissed a storybook and felt its gentle caress and never looked back, plunged deeply into a physical connection from which I could not easily disentangle myself. I felt and experienced, tasted, touched, dreamed and longed for more. I had no idea I was developing a vocabulary advanced for my years, learning history and plot and character development. I read because I must read; I read because I loved the worlds and lives that I could explore. I grew to love words and characters like people, and the stories became at times more real to me than the mundane round of home and school.

There was a certain influence in the form of my need to escape. Childhood was difficult. Unhappy in her marriage, my mother set aside her textbooks and became lost to me in her affair with Harlequin Romances. My father graduated college with a degree in social work or counseling, but never put it or books to use again. His desires developed toward copious amounts of alcohol. Fellow students mocked my snooty use of big words to the point that I retreated further into the books for solace. The characters might surprise me or the plot may take an uncertain turn, but always things resolved themselves in one way or another. My dearest love seldom let me down and never deserted me.

 Here in the library I found my guidance, my hold on life – I read The Secret Garden (My second grade teacher told me that it had been her favorite as a child, and I always respected the thoughts and opinions of my teachers, who seemed the only people who understood the importance of words and ideas.) One valuable lesson my father taught me was that movies could have meanings – themes – He asked us after taking us to see The NeverEnding Story what the movie had meant, and when we couldn’t come up with an answer, he said that it was that we must never give up or lose hope. I clung to that idea, and I took it further into the world of my books – what did each of them mean? What was the lesson to be learned here, and how could I use it to face the other world, the reality, that I must live in? So I read The Secret Garden, and I decided that I must always try to banish my fears and failures, worries and losses with positive thoughts and actions. I read A Little Princess because I’d liked The Secret Garden so much, and this new line of thinking led me farther into the books instead of out of them. The  idea that Sara Crewe could imagine herself a princess no matter how difficult or ugly her world became, an idealized version of a princess, of the sort that was always kind, polite, and generous toward others – and that she could imagine this hard enough to make it a reality! I pretended for a good two years after that. My inner life became more and more real to me. There I was protected; brave and strong and no one could hurt me.

By third grade, my teacher was telling my mother at conferences: “Heather lives in a world all her own – I wish I could go there sometimes, because it seems like such a nice place.” She showed my mother her revolving book rack and told her emphatically, “Heather has read ALL these books! I need to order more so she’s got new people and places to explore when she gets done with her work.” My favorite was Helen Keller’s Teacher. After all, the blind girl who accomplished so much was not nearly as fascinating as the remarkable woman who taught her. Additionally, I admired how Ann Sullivan worked her way out of poverty and near blindness herself. She was a strong woman who stood up to people when it was important to her.

In fourth grade I was reading At The Back of the North Wind, A Wrinkle in Time, Little Women, Lloyd Alexander, and The Complete Sherlock Holmes. I loved Holmes – such a clever, unorthodox man.  Every time I completed a book or series, I felt a sweet melancholy slip over me at the loss. I believe I took Holmes especially hard. I wanted to be his Irene Adler, but it was never meant to be and I mourned his passing. I’d wait a respectful amount of time before the dull emptiness gave wake to such a deep longing that I would find myself among the book stacks again, hungrily reading titles and stealing illicit glances at covers. I read books about Russia, Ireland, the Aids epidemic, biography after biography. If I saw Lawrence of Arabia, I looked up T.E. Lawrence and I read about him. If we read about Amelia Earhart in class, then I’d have to look her up at the library and read more.  I had a growing fixation with the 60’s which began with my mother’s interest in the Kennedys and ended with me reading up on any and every major historical figure I heard of from the time: Dylan and Baez, Warhol, Lenny Bruce, Martin Luther King Jr – oh, and the Beatles. Oh, they were my first loves in the music industry, so in addition to reading every awful tell-all book I could find I naturally knew all their music. I could probably write another entire blog on the 60’s – the music, the movies, the singers, actors, and major events.  I read the books on this time period and many others. Classmates came to me as much as to the Librarian if they needed to find something to read or for a report.

Fifth Grade: I'm spending the night at my friend Toni's house. She and her other friend decide that I need a makeover. They proceed to sit me in a chair and pull out all the brushes, make-up and hairspray they can find. They talk about my features, the volume and texture of my hair, and experiement on me for at least half an hour. When they get distracted, I sneak into Toni's closet. I may not know the word "objectify" at this time, but I resent the feeling that goers along with it, so  when I find Alice Walker's The Color Purple on the floor, I pick it up and read for the rest of the night.

Sixth grade and I was reading my parents’ World Book Encyclopedias. Actually, I'd been looking at the pictures since I was a small child. That year I looked up Greek Mythology, the kings and queens of England, every reference to King Arthur that I could find – one subject would have a list of sub-subjects beneath it, and I would be eagerly turning pages to discover this next treasure, on and on until I had everything read except the rather dry accounts of geography or references to mathematics.  That was the year I read To Kill a Mockingbird, and recognized in the imaginary games Scout and her brother played in the backyard my own childhood gambols with my brother, understood  that she loved books so much that she said learning to read was like learning to breathe – and envied her the calm, steady presence of Atticus Finch.

In the Seventh grade my English teacher was the esteemed Mr. Ceaderholm, a man who always struck me as better suited to the college environment than to a middle school. He treated us like adults and had high expectations for our work.  When I wrote a book report on Susan Cooper’s work, he cornered me and demanded to know why I wasn’t reading The Classics, a smart girl like me. I wasn’t sure why not, though I rather resented the implication that Susan Cooper wasn’t worthy of my time. Still, this was a challenge. I read Dickens and fell in love with Sydney Carlton. I read Jane Austin and the Bronte Sisters.  Oedipus Rex, Plato (Loved Socrates!), Wordsworth, Longfellow, Whitman, and Twain. To this day compassionate, daring and eccentric Jane Eyre is my favorite read. I adored Jane. She reminded me of myself.

In Eighth grade, I read Gone With The Wind in one night.  Strange choice, I'd think, but every year the film came to television in mini-series form and my mother would watch it while I was always sent to bed. My curiosity was aroused. Then I tried experimenting with Stephen King, but the language was shocking at the time and  Christine had me eying antique cars suspiciously for months.

I read my way through high school, read toward my dreams, read toward a better reality, read toward the future. I know plot and character development. Writing comes to me as easily as breathing. To this day find myself vexed when life doesn’t fit this pattern. I pick out conflicts, climaxes – and wait for conclusions that never quite come. My life is a series of chapters, the people I meet flat or round characters as they or I choose them to be, the setting  sometimes less than to be desired. I take everything and decide what the meaning is, and base where I go next upon what those meanings tell me. I know of no other way to live. I have a very hard time relating to people who don’t have any desire to read, who don’t love words and stories with the same passion as I do. Love is an exclusive thing, shared between two people to such an extent that no one else can comprehend what the draw is. I love reading. It excites me, interests me, and seems to know my thoughts as much as to evoke them, putting it all into words across a page – worlds across a page.

“In what earthly way is reading ever anywhere near as good or better than sex?! ” challenged a co-worker.

I smiled. “You can go as fast or as slow as you like, as deeply or emotionally involved as you want, and you don’t have to worry about the pleasure of your partner because the book needs you as much as you need the book, and the two of you share something so profoundly beautiful together than you will feel that connection for the rest of your life. It’s better than sex. It’s love.”

“You’re crazy!” he declared.

Nah.

I’m just a romantic.