When I was in 1st grade, I got a trophy for reading 205 books. When I was in second grade my mom and I would go to the Phoenix Public Library and check out 75 books at a time, 25 on my card, 25 on my mom's card and 25 on my dad's card, and I would read them all as quickly as I could, transferring books from the "to-read" stack to the "read" stack on the floor of our mobile home until there were no more books in the "to-read" stack. And then we would go back and get 75 more. I got a trophy for reading 1005 books that year.
By 3rd grade I had a new teacher who measured reading with a more sophisticated "pages read" system. Continuing our weekly library visits, I read 8,000 pages in 3rd grade, and 11,000 pages in 4th grade.
My 5th grade literacy markers are lost to me as I mostly remember a few other things from the 5th grade. Mr. M was a good teacher and I borked his best compass with a magnet and never owned up to it. This was the peak of my on-again, off-again childhood romance with Angel B. We would "french" after school. My laugh has evolved over the course of my life, and that year it took the form of opening my mouth wide, emitting no sound, and heaving my sides in silent laughter. I once got kicked out of class for laughing enthusiastically but completely silently. Me and my friend Chris B. dominated the soccer league that year. This was the peak of Diana M's crush on me, during which she kicked me in the balls repeatedly during the soccer tournament. She seemed regretful. And then there was the trip to the superstition mountains where Mr. M. held a rattlesnake at bay on a desert hiking trail while the rest of us scooted around it, the braver among us sneaking a peak at the snake. I was not among the braver of us.
By 6th grade, I had been uprooted and dragged to Idaho, and most everyone hated me that first year because my dad was the principle. He was strict and the previous teacher had basically let a nascent Lord of the Flies scenario bloom and they all hated him for not letting them have the run of the place and me by proxy. One lunchtime early on, K, who is now one of my best lifelong friends, crawled over to me on his hands and knees, laughing too hard to speak or stand, and said, "H, H says to zip up your pants before we all puke." That was how that year went. It was also the year I met the first of many Matts, who introduced me to Douglas Adams. So much of that year was spent on the Hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy and Robotech, which I had been introduced to by K, which are among the first of my pulpy SF loves.
My reading list more or less remained the same through 7th and 8th grade, discreetly picking up pulpy SF, or Tarzan or Black Beauty, or Wizard of Oz books from the tiny one-room library in Eagle, ID and devouring them as quick as possible. I would sometimes read a novel a night at this point.
In High School, I found old SF short stories. I'm not sure who I discovered first, Isaac Asimov or Arthur C. Clarke, but I devoured their short stories, and then novels. The collected short stories of each, the Rama series and the Foundation series remain some of my favorite stories to this day. I read less Ray Bradbury then, but wish I had read more. And I neglected other classics, which I wish I had not. I still have not finished Moby Dick. The chapter that's purely an encyclopedia entry on the different kinds of whales just tanked me. It never occurred to me I could skip it. This was also my introduction to Robert Jordan and the Wheel of Time series, which was not finished before his untimely death and which I still have not made time to finish myself.
In college I got back into kids books, partly influenced by the women I wanted to get with who were in to YA literature. But I developed and still retain a deep appreciation for A.A. Milne and the two Winnie the Pooh books. The chapter where Christopher Robin tells Pooh he has to leave the forest and grow up still gets me. I was introduced to more fantasy authors during this period, like Terry Goodkind, and the Death Gate Cycle by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman, which remains one of my favorite blends of fantasy and SF to date.
It was college where I began to dumb obscene amounts of money into collecting the comic books I'd been deprived of for a while and also where my gaming habit began in earnest. I had been reading comics and playing games throughout my childhood, but it was college where the balance of time shifted from reading novels to reading comics and playing video games. From there the latter two activities slowly eroded my reading time over the next decade or so. At which point social media and glow screen swiping started eating into my comic book reading.
Today, I have one and a half huge shelves devoted to my "to-read" list, which are overflowing. There are at least 50 books there that I have not read yet, or want to read again before I get rid of them. Among those languishing unread are four books my thoughtful boyfriend got me as presents, and 2 or 3 novels published by a friend. My comics go unread, although I would like to read some more of Marvel's Thor. Although I remain satisfied with the great purge that reduced my comics collection from 17 long boxes to a more reasonable 4.
I play a lot of video games still. I think it's the thing I've been doing the most since I came out of the closet. What drives me to play is a persistent desire to dissociate/procrastinate since coming out (that shit was hard, y'all, although maybe not an eternal excuse) and some kind of mild OCD that enjoys simple worlds with simple puzzle solving and simulated achievement which my brain mistakes for actual achievement. All that adds up to a state where I receive video game tasks like the Labors of Hercules. "Kill one thousand orcs? Yes, I will restore my honor."
Most of my reading from day to day comes form my twitter feed, and the occasional great article that gets linked there. At night I browse the paranormal/woo side of reddit half asleep, hoping to find something imaginative there. My favorite to date is the random poster who laid out a system of higher powers that theorized that Jehovah was but one of a pantheon of gods and he was just the Law and Order aspect.
Which is not to disparage video games or social media, at least not right now. This is just to say my habits have changed.
And good lord do I miss the reader I used to be.
No comments:
Post a Comment