Reading

I was ALWAYS reading when I was growing up.  Well, maybe not constantly 24/7 reading.  I do seem to have memories of other things like chores and school and animals, and family and TV and movies etc.   But reading was my very favorite thing to do.

I remember the summer after kindergarten when we children made the daily race to the mailbox after seeing the mail truck pass on down the road, and finding my very first Weekly Reader  magazine that Mums would subscribe to for each of us children in the summer time.   Our parents and grandparents were wonderful about giving us books as gifts, and we had a huge collection of the classic Little Golden Books. Much of my monthly allowance was spent on the Scholastic Book Orders through school.  Our house was filled with books and magazines, including shelves and shelves of The National Geographic magazine and The Book of Knowledge Encyclopedias and Scripture Story Books.  The Bobbsey Twins, Little House on the Prairie, Trixie Beldon, Black Beauty, Heidi, Robinson Crusoe, Treasure Island, Harriet the Spy, and others were among my favorites.

My favorite place to read was my bedroom, lying sprawled out on the bed.   The next best place to read was curled up in one of the big easy chairs in the living room.  Sometimes I would sneak upstairs to the quiet bedrooms of my siblings and read on their beds.  But no matter where I ended up, I could stay there all day reading, oblivious to any of  the noise and activity going on around me, oblivious (mostly)  to the reruns of the TV shows blaring next to me, and especially oblivious to the eventual entreaties of my dear mother to put the book down and do my chores or my piano practicing, or eat my dinner, or turn out the light and go to sleep.

Where was your favorite place to read?   What were your favorite books to read?