A Reader is Born

The Beginnings

My daughter who is expecting her first child and I were out walking and talking about children, behavior, and education.  Our discussion led us to children learning to read-the hows and whys.  I studied literacy, so I began sharing what I believed to be true.  She laughed and said her husband believes somehow he just knew how to read.  No one taught him.  It just happened because he could read before he began school.  I, too, knew how to read before I began my formal education, but I don’t recall how I learned. I suggested that probably my mother read to us often and possibly my older sister helped, but there are no family stories to support my thought.  She points out that her early memories are there only because we have kept them alive.  So does she really remember or is she just reflecting about the memory?  Much of what we do remember about our youth is from story telling.  What I do remember about my early years is that I spent hours reading either in our home or at my grandmothers.  We did not journey to the library although my mother must have at some point because money was used for necessities and books were not considered a necessity although we seemed to always have them around. I also have a vivid memory of my first grade year (kindergarten was a novelty at that point in time), but as most youngsters, I was unaware that I was a little different from my classmates, kids I had known and played with for years prior to school, so my understanding that I could read before I began school and most of them could not came later.

I had the best teacher in the world.  Mrs. M was young and beautiful, lively and creative.  Not that I had anything to compare  to except Sunday school, but I loved her instantly.  She kept the classroom neat and orderly.  She did not yell nor do I recall her getting angry-disappointed in our behavior, yes- but never angry.  Our classroom had a full bank of west facing windows that let in all of the Texas sunshine, so it stayed warm in the winter even with the old furnace.  When she read to us, I would hang on every word although I did think the stories were too short and sometimes too silly.  I must have learned the names Dick and Jane the first day because I was ready for new characters and new adventures.  Some of the seat work was a bit repetitive and dull to me but like the dutiful daughter that I was, and the teacher pleaser I was tagged later, I did what was expected. Plus I had played teacher for years prior to first grade, and my sister pilfered the trash cans in her classroom for extra worksheets to bring home to me and me students.  I seemed to always finish first but I never thought anything about that.  A six year old child can sense that they are different, but they know not how.

Mrs. M must have known that I was different because she began letting me stay in the classroom during recess a few days a week.  Most of the time I wanted to be outside playing with friends, but other days I wanted time to myself to read and write like I did at home.  I wanted to choose the books and subjects.  On the days I stayed indoors, Mrs. M would unlock the book room that was housed between the first and second grade classrooms.  She said I could read any book I could reach,  and if I wanted one from an upper shelf, she would come and get it for me.  I was instructed to be careful and quiet, so I closed the door and selected my first book.  I quickly sat on a step stool and began to read.  Recess was typically 30 minutes depending on the weather, but that 30 minutes seemed like seconds.  I wanted to stay in that book room the rest of the year. I loved the musty, old smell of the books no longer used.  I delicately touched the spines of the  new books to feel the printing on the cover before making a selection. I felt like a queen on that stool with my book servants ready at my beck and call.  I do remember reading all of the geography books (2-6th grade level), and then I moved on to the reading primers, but I don’t recall any others.  That first day, I heard the bell ring to signal the end of recess, so I replaced the book and quietly slipped out of the room to meet my class in the hall way for restroom and drink breaks.  Someone asked me if I was in trouble and had to stay indoors.  I am sure I said of course not, but I probably didn’t say anything.  Why would I be in trouble?  I rarely spoke unless asked, and that seemed to be the main reason others were in trouble.  I preferred reading to playing, and when the cold harsh winds of winter died and the soft gentle breezes of spring began, I would take books outside and sit under the tree so I could read.

No one ever called me a nerd to my face at school, but my siblings would sometimes.  I did wear very thick glasses for distance, but I took them off to read.  I was athletic and musical, and although in later years I won awards for such, the one thing I wanted to be the best was reading and there were no awards for that.  The reward was knowing I could pick up a book and within seconds be lost to this world and living in another.  As I grew older, my mother would bring books from her school’s library for me to read.  She taught in high school and I was in elementary.  She never told me I could not read any particular book although she did say I should not read the Enquirer magazines at my grandmother’s, but I thought it was a funny little paper, and I learned how to take life events and turn them into fiction.  The novels I read were full of life, and they were rich with characters and setting details of which I could not simply copy.  I read to hear the words in my mind, to see the dancers float, to taste the salty sweat that lingered on a lip, to smell the bitterness of snow, and to feel the heartache or joy.  I wanted to write like those author’s I read.  And thus I begin.