Monday, October 29, 2012

The Beginning Of A New Me

It all started with some letters on our refrigerator. I noticed them the first time I walked in the door when they brought me home from the hospital. My mom tells me stories of how I loved making all kinds of combinations of letters and words. As a baby my mother loved reading short stories to me before bed. She loved to see me listening intently like I knew what was going on, but in reality I was just fascinated by the pictures. Of course now I can't remember that, but she said I loved it. From then on, reading became second nature to me.
Once I was old enough to understand, my mom started reading me children's books like, Dr. Seuss and Barney. She tells me about how she had to re-read them until I had the story memorized. I LOVE listening to my mother read. It comes so natural to her; it's like listening to Adele sing. It took me into an imagery world full of happiness and unicorns. I can remember her reading me anything from Bible stories to Barney. My favorite stories to hear were the wonderful adventures of Barney. To this day I still have a Barney stuffed animal, although I do not use him to cuddle with anymore.
When I started first grade I began reading novels by myself. The first reading goal I ever set was to read ever signal Junie B. Jones book out there. Those novels might have been lower level, but as a first grader I was very proud of the books I read. I always tended to read at a higher level than the other children in my grade. I remember loving to read on my own but hating to read in class. The stories we read at school never grabbed my interest. We would read about some girl and her dog Max, which generally put me to sleep.  
As I got older I started to love reading for pleasure more and more. I began to read multiple books at once; one at school, which I read during free time, and one at home. Reading allowed me to go to a place where no one but me and the characters I created existed. I loved reading modern fiction because I could easily relate to the story I was reading. My favorite book is My Sister’s Keeper. It has a little bit of everything in it; family drama, science, and teenage girl’s relationship.
Now I do not read as much as I should. My vocabulary used to be very strong but it has slowly faded since I do not read as much anymore. As a teenager it is hard to balance a social life, school work, softball practice, and still have time to read. I still love to read when I have free time. Other teenagers think it is nerdy to read, but I like to read because it keeps your mind thinking. Also, you can read things about today’s society that keeps you aware of the things going on around you. To me life would not be the same without reading.