A boy, his books, and a blog
Today is my wife’s 30th birthday and the only thing she’ll hate more than me making a big deal of it, is me making a big deal of it on a blog that reaches tens of people. So instead of writing a sappy post about how amazing and beautiful she is (both of which are true) I’m going to tell you about some literary love stories that don’t hold a candle to our love. That is not to say that I don’t like these books, in fact, many of them are favorites. They just don’t compare to us.
A year ago, I graduated with my master’s degree in Reading and Literacy. And I read a surprisingly small amount of books in those two years, considering it was a degree in Reading and Literacy. By the end of the program, excluding the books I had to read for required reading, I’d read twelve books in two years. It was embarrassing, considering books are such a big part of my life.
So I challenged myself to read 25 books this year. That seems like a small goal, I understand, but I work the equivalent of two full-time jobs, so I’m not just swimming in spare time. Also, after two years of really not reading, I wasn’t sure how hard it would be for me to get back into my reading groove.
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I know, I know. It’s like heresy to say that anything is better than books, right? It hurts me to admit it, too. But there is–at least for me–something so much better than books.
Today, I spent Christmas with my family. My mom and dad, one of my uncles, my brothers and their significant others (one’s married and one’s engaged), and my wife. It was just so nice. Everything was chill. Everything was beautiful. It was one of those rare holidays that you absolutely could not write a sitcom about. (There have been several holidays in my family that would inspire scripts upon scripts for a sitcom writer.)
We ate delicious food. We laughed a lot. We ate some more. We opened presents. Something I love about my family and the way we’ve morphed over the past few years is that we no longer make Christmas a big show. We’ve taken some of the materialism out of it and our gifts are few and thoughtful. My family used to have a history of extravagance, sometimes to the point of thoughtlessness, in our gift-giving. But I really enjoy this subdued thing we do now. And bonus points when we exchange something handmade.
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To all the books I’ll never read, I hope you’ll accept this letter of apology.
It’s not that I don’t think you’re beautiful. I do think you’re beautiful. The way your covers shine and glint in the light is gorgeous. The way your title sprawls across your spine is awe-inspiring.
It’s not that I think you’re gross. You’re not gross. Your pages splay out like a newly opened lily. They waft the fragrant perfume of ink and paper, of dust and memories and creativity. You permeate the room with hope and power and frenzy and love. I love that smell more than you’ll ever know.
Read moreI recently stumbled across this “My Life in Books” tag and thought it looked fun and the right level of narcissistic, so I went for it.
1, Find a book for each of your initials.
Pippi Longstocking by Astrid Lingred
Ready Player One by Ernest Cline
American Gods by Neil Gaiman
I have a confession. I’m not proud of it (but I’m not ashamed either.) I’m not flaunting it. It’s just part of who I am. I’m going to take a deep breath and type it very quickly, the textual equivalent of ripping off a band-aid.
I probably hate your favorite book. Don’t worry, and please don’t take it personally. There are many, many reasons for me to hate your favorite book. And I’m prepared to list and discuss them all. Or at least the most important. BUT don’t worry. At the end of this post, I’m prepared to give you a list of books to try and also hate.
So now, without further ado, these are actual reasons I have hated somebody’s favorite book.
Read moreThe first thing you should probably know is that Yvonne Worthington Chase was dead.
Allow me to pose a hypothetical question. Totally for rhetoric’s sake. That’s it. Is it weird to stage book blog pictures in the middle of a busy, dimly lit coffee shop? Asking for a friend, of course.
Sorry. That is totally unrelated to this review. I just was trying to get the ball rolling. You know, try to start friendly conversation. Make things comfortable. Now that we’re all friends:
I have a yearly tradition. Every year at Christmas, I read through Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol. I know it doesn’t change. I know it’s the same story every time. Scrooge always learns his lesson. Tiny Tim always blesses us, every one. (And I tear up every time, like it’s the first time.) Y’all. I read this book for the first time in the 7th grade. I can remember Mrs. Hagens, my seventh grade English teacher guiding us through it. And I still read it every year. For 17 years now. I’ve read that book 17 times. Making it my most reread book.
But this year, I changed it up. I did something different (and the entire world gasped a collective gasp because that really is very out of character for me.) This year, instead, I read The Afterlife of Holly Chase by Cynthia Hand. And it has been a delightful read.
This post will contain no spoilers.
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So, here’s the deal.
I’m The Plucky Reader and I am addicted to books. I have been for as long as I can remember. I’ve been reading so long, I can’t even remember learning to read. I know that my grandmother taught me by using Disney tapes. She said that I learned different letters using the different fonts on the VHS tapes. I was four the first time I read a chapter book. Not because I was exceptional, but because I was one step off from those creepy Your Baby Can Read kids that used to be advertised on TV when I was little. (Totally parting the kimono here, but those kids couldn’t read, they recognized sight words as a unit, the same way we see a stop sign and know what it means without reading it.)
So, life progressed the way you would expect for a book nerd. I was everybody’s friend. I was the quarterback of the football team. I graduated valedictorian. I married my high school sweetheart. We have 2.5 kids, a white picket fence, two dogs, several acres in the country, and exactly $30 million in my bank account.
Or, you know, I have a handful of friends, I rode horses and ate my feelings, I graduated just outside of the top 10% of my class, and I married my college sweetheart. We have 3 dogs and no children and a chainlink fence in the country and our lives are pretty damned amazing. You can probably guess I wear glasses, because–hello–stereotypes exist for a reason, amirite? And you know what, I wouldn’t trade anything.
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