Day 2: My First (and Forever) Love

When I was about three, my mom walked by my room and heard my little girl voice telling a story outloud to myself. She peeked in and found me sitting on the floor with my favorite Winnie-the-Pooh book in front of me. I was reading the story, exactly as she read it to me many times before, turning the pages to continue following the story. She was amazed that I was reading so well at three years of age. Then she looked a little closer and realized that I was holding the book upside down. Apparently I'd had her read it to me so many times that I had memorized the story word-for-word, complete with when the pages were supposed to be turned.

However, it didn't take me long to figure out how to read those words for real. By the time I started kindergarten, I was reading at a first grade level. During reading time, I'd leave the room and work with some other people. While the rest of my classmates were learning how to sound out c - a - t, I was reading stories about a clueless maid named Amelia Bedelia who always managed to mess things up, a black and white dog named Harry who hated taking baths, and various rhyming nonsense from the ever popular Dr. Suess (my favorite was Hop on Pop. I checked it out from the library every chance I got.)

And thus began my eternal love affair with books.

Most of my childhood memories somehow include my books. I remember the endless car rides to who-cares-where for "family vacation" where I discovered the Margo series (a Christian mystery series from the 60's that I dug out of my grandmothers collection). And those random times when my parents decided to pretend we were the camping sort and would drag me and my brothers to their version of a "campsite" where I would find a quiet area under some trees and lose myself anywhere but there.

I remember in grade school when we would get those book order pamphlets. My mom would always let me pick one book from them and I would pour over the options and debate my choices until she finally gave in and let me get two. Then I would wait anxiously for the day the books would arrive and when they finally did, I wouldn't be able to wait until the end of the school day so that I could rush home and curl up with my precious new treasures.

I remember discovering the Baby-sitters Club books from one of those book orders. They were the greatest books ever and soon became my best friends. I remember how sad I was in Jr. High to have to give them up in order to grow into some older matieral. I then grew into the Sweet Valley High series. I remember my brothers in tee-ball on Saturdays, which happened to be right next to the library, so each week I would go over and collect as many of the books I could get my hands on and check them out, just to bring them back next week and swap them for some that I hadn't seen yet. And in high school, when I sadly had to come to the same farewell to those friends as well.

In college I took a Lit for Adolescents class, which introduced me to the classic "coming of age" stories that most people read in high school, but I missed because I was taking college Literiture classes instead. Stories like "To Kill a Mockingbird", "The Outsiders", "Lord of the Flies", and "Roll of Thunder, Hear My Cry". I rediscovered the beauty and innocents of adolescent literature and started reading other things directed to that age group. I also decided to start dabbling in the true classics: Jane Austen, Charles Dickens, Nathanial Hawthorne and the like.

Over the course of many years, I've spent considerably less time with my love than I used to. I try to sneak in an hour here or there, maybe during my lunch or just before bed, but as life continues to bring new passions into my life, my old one gets set to the side once again.

But I'll never completely lose my first love. My dream is to one day have a home that has a large library where I can display all my treasured friends and a place for us to reunite from time to time.