I’ve been reading a lot lately. At night.
Because frankly:
A.) it’s a whole lot better than staring up at the ceiling.
and
B) the TV antenna in this house picks up somewhere approaching two channels on a good night.
I kind’ve got started back last semester with our required reading assignments, namely, with
A Walk in the Woods.
Up till then I’d gotten accustomed to reading smaller pieces of things – newspaper drivel, magazine articles, a few good weblogs, a cereal box here and there, etc..
I’d forgotten the simple nicety of a good book, reading written stuff that required you to devote more than a 15 minute mind scan. Hmm that’s interesting. Move on. Hmm that’s interesting. Move on. Hmm that’s interesting. What can I remember from all that stuff? Nodda.
I remember back when I was in third grade, and for the first time being stuck in a class with little or no friends who I could easily interact or desire to interact with, as compared to previous years of school. I think everybody’s gone through a similar time or two. Distant.
Distant like you’re in the waiting room at the doctors office. Distant like the feeling that can be had walking down a crowded sidewalk, quietly resolute to avoid eye contact with other sidewalk people and content in getting on with your own bidness. Stick to yourself and find some form of occupation/distraction/hobby/thing other than normal social behavior because frankly these people are losers and I could care less. A whole lot less. Besides, that whole “long division” and “I hate math” era had just ushered in and bursted my bubble of all – play – no – study - straight A’s - in - my - sleep - scholastic confidence.
I needed an outlet. A diversion.
Our school library sucked. But we had a good librarian and a few choice selections of fantastic bookery.
Mrs. Branum first read to us
How To Eat Fried Worms out loud, a chapter or so a day. Then
Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing by Judy Blume. From there I guess I kind of started reading on my own. Books by the same author. I remember
Superfudge and
Freckle Juice.
Choose Your Own Adventure books. Somewhere approaching 5,782 of them. I was all-up-in those things.
All kinds of other stuff as well. Every day involved at least 2 hours of solid reading. Looking back it was a nice time.
Fourth grade I vividly remember
Where the Red Fern Grows. It took me there. All the way there. I was there. With those dogs and that kid and that mountain lion. All of it.
But fourth grade put me back with many cohorts/associates/cronies/allies/partners in crime and the reading retreat tapered off somewhere around three fourths of the way through
Journey to the Center of the Earth. (The part where they were on the raft in the subterranean ocean, got really boring.)
I remember being in Junior High and learning that Mrs. Branum had died of a freak heart attack in her forties. I remember being pretty upset and shocked. She did a lot for me. She read to us; got me interested in books; left me alone to read as much as I wanted, even during social studies.
Sure I’ve always read a bit more than the average person, but up until now, such inputting of letters words sentences paragraphs chapters and books, has dipped in, under, and around roughly nill. Bill Bryson’s book though, “A Walk in the Woods,” really did something to me. It had been a long time since I’d stayed up late at night, even laughing out loud, ..at a book. Not the TV. Not Conan or SNL or Seinfeld, but wow a book. Hey this is a book. I got me some books. Don’t worry though, its not that I’m trying to “get my learn on,” its just a nice thing to do before you go to sleep. A nice thing to do when she’s not around.
