So Many Books, Too Little Time

Being an voracious reader, I have devoured an enormous number of books in my life.  I don't hesitate to say, in the thousands.  For most of my adult life, aside from the first year after babies were born, when you have to  figure out how to bathe to go to the bathroom with the little darlings, I have averaged about 2 books a week.

My earliest book memories are reading Trixie Belden (girl detective)  novels at about 10 or 11.   My sister, (3 years younger) says I never climbed trees or played outside with her because I was always reading.  I broke my leg at 11 while riding my blue Schwinn bike.  I was in a hip to toe cast for 3 months.  Books were my companion.  I limped for some time, which reminds me,  we moved  during that time and some classmates thought I was recovering from polio.  That was early 1960s so it was on everyone's mind.  We would line up in school, for the sugar cube with the polio vaccine on it.  Was permission from the parents even requested?  I somehow don't think so.   I think they just did it. 

During that move, we lived with friends of my parents while they were involved in the move.  It was at their house that I found Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe and  Marjorie Morningstar by Herman Wouk.  I was 11.  What was I doing reading Herman Wouk?   I'm not sure which came first, the books or the broken leg but after that I was a reader.

It's difficult to pen down a favorite or even a top ten list of my own.  They tend to change when I find a new one or I forget a good one.  Always in there though, is Wuthering Heights, The Great Gatsby, and  East of Eden.  I would also choose The Thorn Birds, Gone With The Wind, and one I found this past winter, by Kate Morton,  The Forgotten Garden.

Surprising to me too, is that I have not joined the electronic book market.  I've not tried it, so I can't say I don't like it, but I think I wouldn't.  I like the feel of a book in my hands but I can see that those huge ones would be much easier to read on a Kindle or a Nook type thing.  I'm not so much a Stephan King fan anymore... say not for the last 15 years really, but his "The Dome" sounds interesting.  I even bought the paperback version and turned it in to my resale book shop.  The thing has to be 3 inches thick, looks like a textbook and weighs a ton.  So I guess I'll never know about that one.

All kinds of subjects interest me.  I will hit the best sellers, the top 10 lists, Oprah's books, biographies and non-ficiton.  I separate autobiographies/biographies from non-fiction because I have read some that I am sure took artistic license.  Then again, some of those tales, you can't make up.  I saw Meredith Baxter on Oprah yesterday and she broke my heart.  While she was filming "Family Ties" , looking like the perfect Mom, she was living in an abusive home.  Her on screen husband, Michael Gross was there too, along with 3 of her children,  so I tend  to believe this one.  I'm on the hunt for "  Untied: a Memoir of Family, Fame and Floundering".   I also collect First Lady Biographies and Autobiographies.

I always travel with a book in the car, to any appointments, on vacations, and to events.  When my daughters were little, they didn't have nap time, they had "Quiet Time".  They had to stay on their beds but they could look at books if they weren't tired.  They are all readers.  My grandsons sneak flashlights under their covers at night to read.  Their Mom says for that, there is no way they will get in trouble.  Their other grandma pays for baskets.touchdowns and home runs.  This Nana pays for books read and  every few months, I send them new flashlights.