It’s miraculous that, after resisting reading for years, I’ve turned into the voracious reader that I am. I’ve always been an academic at heart, but barely anything ever served to me in school was inspiring; bad, district-selected literature made reading synonymous with doing chores. While I listened to music and played sports for fun, I couldn’t believe that my best friend was off consuming hundreds of pages at a time - voluntarily - on top of school work. It was frustrating - why couldn’t I love to read?
It wasn’t until about three years ago where it clicked. There were things out there that I could love - and could love me back. I could choose what I wanted to read, and I didn’t have to synthesize it anywhere beyond my head: not in a paper, not in an oral presentation, but simply when and how I wanted to think about it. I could choose not to think about it. These days, I pray someone else has shared a literary experience with me so we can talk and talk about it for hours.
Now, having just finished my tenth book of the year - a small feat to some, certainly to those who don’t know me, but a milestone for me - I’m so thrilled to think about the place that books have in my life. I’ve certainly come a long way; I won’t leave the house without a paperback in my bag, and now I’ve written a book, as well as am pursuing a career in publishing. Books are everything to me, and have become more important than most things in my life. It feels like it was a thousand years ago - or maybe merely a dream - when they didn’t connect the way they do now.
Beyond quantity, I’ve read authors that have inspired me, fueled me, informed me, and stunned my like never before. That is the most substantial detail of all.
I’m keeping my fingers crossed that both my own work and my career ambitions can materialize the way my love for literature has. Hell, if something so seemingly stagnant can blossom into the most essential thing on my radar, I think anything is possible.
M
