~ Reading, It Expands the Mind ~

My Mother use to read to me as a young child. I think that is where I get my love of a story that you can close your eyes to and become a part of. I remember her reading “Black Beauty” when I was about six years old. She had a voice and a way of speaking that made the book come alive. I would rather listen to her read than watch TV (I still loved going to the movies though). She is the reason I wanted to learn to read. I would get in trouble in grade school during reading class because when the teacher would have us take turns reading out loud I would be pages ahead when it was my turn. She just thought I wasn’t paying attention but it drove me nuts to have to wait and follow along at a speed that did not allow my mind to get lost in the words. My favorite thing in school was when we got to order books from a handout. Mom and Dad couldn’t say no to a book. They did however have to limit me to two or three. Anything about the West, horses, or some type of animal, and sometimes maybe an art book. Of course the first book I ordered and read on my own was "Black Beauty". I couldn’t wait for them to come in, and when they did I was in such a hurry to read them that it seemed an awful long wait until I could order some more. As I grew older my interests changed or expanded some. I went from reading about “Benji” a little beagle and “Old Bones” an unwanted race horse, to Biographies on sports greats like Johnny Unitas, Roger Staubach, or Hank Aaron. I would stay up all night in my room reading, then my Mom would get mad because I did not want to get up and go to school. That’s probably where I got the habit of staying up all night and sleeping all day when I could. That still plagues me to this day. After high school and a short stint at working at a grocery store, I bummed around for a while. One of the brief periods that I did not have a job and did not work for my Dad laying carpet. I would read anything I could get my hands on except my Mom’s Romance novels (Ok, I read one once, it‘s a sad day when you find out that your Mom‘s a freak). My Dad had a book in his hands all the time, I mean all the time. Anytime he had a break at work he would read, he would read at home, in a store parking lot, he would even sit in his truck in the driveway and read. He said it was the only place quiet enough when you had five kids. Always Westerns, Louis L’amour, Max Brand, Zane Grey. Louis L’amour was always the best and he wrote a few that were made into Movies, like one of my favorites “Hondo” with non other than, John Wayne. My Mom would read westerns too. My dad would trade paper backs with “Bill’s Barber Shop and Book Store” he cut my Dads hair and had used books for sail or trade. My Dad would have gone broke at the rate he and my Mom read buying new books. It was the only luxury my parents allowed themselves. Anyway it meant that I always had an endless supply of books. Eventually it caught up with me and I started to get headaches. They came more and more as I read. Still I would read all night and fight a headache all day. Reading glasses did not help, better lighting did not help, reading for shorter periods of time was just infuriating. So in time my reading fell to the way side and I found other ways of passing the time. Turned more toward TV and movies, they did not seem to bother my head. We didn’t have cable and my Dad was as bad as I am about keeping up with the times. I was probably 20 before we get a VCR and even then we never had movies for it. Regular TV was so much better back then. Most stations had a movie of the week or a Saturday Movie. That’s where me and Dad would watch our Westerns, or maybe a late night movie would come on. Disney was always good for a pretty good movie. I really liked the ones about animals that were narrated by Rex Allen. He also would announce the National Finals Rodeo back when it was sponsored by Massey Ferguson Tractor. We would even watch “Hee Haw” together. Man that would kill kids now days. I would still pick up a book now and then but as the years went by, it became less and less. Now that I’m trying to catch up with the rest of the world with computers (at forty one) I get headaches again but now I eat a bunch of Excedrin Migraines and seem to do better. There is a whole lot more to look at on a computer than there is on TV. If you can think of it you can most likely click on it somewhere. Thinking about this has sure got me in the mood for a Louis L’amour book, I wonder if Bill’s is still open, Hell he’s probably been dead 20 years now. I guess I’ll have to just click on Amazon dot com. Good Day.