To Read or Not to Read
I was never much of a reader growing up. Though I may have been encouraged to read, much was done to dissuade me and not motivate me. I don’t remember my parents reading to me at all. Though I do remember one book, Uncle Wiggily’s Travels. This was a book about a rabbit that went on many adventures. Each chapter ended with a unique sentence that would lead on to the next story, like “So if toy balloon doesn’t take the spout off the teakettle to blow beans through at the egg beater, I’ll tell you next about Uncle Wiggily’s Hallowe’en.” It’s these endings that made the book memorable. So much so, that I searched them out when my son was young and read them to him. As for me, I’m not sure who read them, if anyone, to me. I may have just picked the book off the bookshelf in my house and tried to read it myself.
Many kids got into series novels like The Hardy Boys, Nancy Drew, The Bobbsey Twins. I remember that I tried a Hardy Boys book once but don’t know if I ever finished it. My series was, Tom Corbett, Space Cadet. It appealed to my inner muse guiding me to the Science Fiction genre. I liked the books so much that I wrote my own version of a Space Cadet story, but instead of using the book characters names, Captain Strong, Tom Corbett, Roger Manning, and Astro, I used the real names of me and my friends Jeff, Steve, and Mark in those roles. I shared this story and its multiple pages with my seventh-grade homeroom teacher. Whether or not he liked it, I don’t remember. I only know that I never got it back.
My teachers in 6th grade and 7th grade did their best to disinterest me in reading. Though the
y picked great books to have us read, they didn’t differentiate instruction for those with lesser reading abilities like me. In sixth grade, the book was the unabridged edition of The Three Musketeers. In 7th grade, it was The Iliad and The Odyssey. That is where I learned how to use Cliff Notes and Classics Illustrated Comics.
On my own, I rarely picked up a book to read. That all changed in college when I was introduced to the author, Alistair MacLean. The first book I read was Ice Station Zebra. From there I read all of his books, saving The Guns of Navarone for last. I hesitated to read that book since I loved the movie so much that I didn’t want to ruin it. The book was just as good.
From then on, I loved reading. Authors like Robert Ludlum, Brian Jacques, Kristen Britain, Philip Pullman, and others keep me going. My favorite book is The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster. My favorite series is Redwall by Brian Jacques. My favorite time to read is at night, or if it is snowing or raining outside and I’m by myself. Most of what I read now are stories and folktales so I can increase my storytelling repertoire and internalize more writing ideas.
Someday I still dream of becoming a published author. My favorite genre being fantasy and science fiction, though I do have a lot of material to write a memoir. I guess time will tell.
