Why We Read: On Bookworms, Libraries, and Just One More Page Before Lights Out

by Shannon Reed

Love’s a thing that’s gathered, chance by chance —“Love and the Years,” Alfred Allen

They, too, chose reading over most other activities, and, like me, many were punished for minor infractions by having books taken away for a day, leaving us to watch television—the horror!—for entertainment.

Omgosh, when I got in trouble ad grounded, my mom took away my current read and my favorite reads (Interview with a Vampire series) as punishment… usually meant I’d just go borrow from the library but still, how my punishment was about reading.

Like the Russian proverb about how one fisherman spots another from one hundred yards away, I feel a familial affection for my fellow longtime, intense readers. We are kin. Quiet, introspective, tea-and-cozy-quilt-loving kin.

I am seen! (Crying now) I quilt too and have an epic mug collection. Ok, not two pages in and I can tell this might be a book for my personal library.

The translation from symbol into meaning. The direct, pleasant diction of the voice inside my head. The influx of information. The transport to other lives, other worlds.

My students tell me “I don’t read anymore” with utter sincerity, and then turn back to their phones and laptops to read away. We all read, all the time. Just perhaps not books.

I’ve also plopped in a bit of reading-adjacent humor because what I love, I (gently) mock.

looking forward to cross-country trips (pretty much just because you get to read in the backseat)