Of Literacy

Movers are fast learners!

Priceless story. You would be surprised how many people don't read. I am glad of the profusion of coffee drinkers because at least some of them end up going to the bookstores as a result. Such a shame that so many miss out on reading, particularly when you think of the amount of time the "average" American spends watching TV.

I don't watch TV, but I find little time to read. Thing is, I can't put my books down when I start them, so I've kept a stack that's waiting for me to have time.

Hmmm guess if I stopped gathering...........nice and amusing article David

I used to have time to read, until I found Gather.

Why is it, do you think, that movers always find a large collection of books so remarkable? The last time we were moved by professional movers we had over 60 cases of books. The men were flabbergasted! One told me that he'd never moved that many books at one time in his whole career. He said too that he'd never seen anyone with as many pots and pans as we had. I just thought that it was unusual for them to think it was unusual.

Certainly people don't need to read to participate in Gather. One can find evidence in comment boxes on a daily basis,

Sadly David, I have been moving my books from home to home for my entire life time and I know for a fact that most people do not read... the average education level for people is incredibly low. When I talk to most people I try really hard to pass for dumb because a dumb person is a happy person! If you sound educated people think you're weird and don't want to be around you.

Its funny the director of the Justice Department at the university has been a close friend of mine for many years and we were talking tonight and she corrected my grammar on a phrase at the gym and then added, "you are so articulate with your speech I am surprised you said that", is that compliment?

I can't live without "my" books. I have several waiting for me...And, I collect Agatha Christie books. I have no real reason why I collect them. I just like having them around like old friends. I confess, I haven't spent a lot of time reading in the last ten or so years. When we moved to FL in 1988 we had to put our stuff in storage for a couple months. Long enough for the moving company people to pilfer things. They took old record albums, our son's D & D books, and large box of laundry detergent. All the other books were untouched.

Nel, that was a "slug", not a compliment. See Jennifer James' site at:
http://www.jenniferjames.com/products/book.htm

I have come down to two kinds of people who read: 1. People who read for reasons, and 2. People who just read.

Nel, you are right. I'm sure you have had the experience of being accused of malice for using an unusual word. Gather helps!

Webduck,
A slug please explain that sounds bad!

Diane,
I have been accused of all kinds of things, and malice is one of them, how did you know?

Been there, done that. Reading is very likely one of the most important gifts to give a child. I began teaching mine to read at age 3. Seriously. It just opens so many new worlds and fosters imagination, something critically lacking in today's society.

I love to read, but my husband hates to read. It doesn't make him less intelligent, just different. My son also loves to read, but my daughter doesn't. We found out she's dyslexic, so no wonder.

Maybe this fellow was overcome by bookcases.

I loved summer vacation when I was a kid. While all the other kids were outside playing, I was at the library every other day getting a stack of books.

Some days I envy people like Wilhelmine's mechanic, who can NOT read...

I pretty much do like Kathleen. I put a few more steps in, though...if I'm unfamiliar, I get used paperback. Then if I love it, I have the choice of moving up to regular paperback or hardback, depending on how much I love it...In the past few years I've taken to getting many things in hardback right from the first, albeit usually secondhand (shout-out to Jai S!) and if they tell you I'm in a Half-Priced Books, don't even bother looking for me in the stacks, just go right back to the Clearance section.

BTW--when unbelievably awesome science fiction author Octavia Butler died last year , one of the things they mentioned was that when she moved to Seattle she went with 300+ cartons of books....now *there* is something to have in your obit, my friend!

I would actually never equate not reading with not being intelligent . . . but it did strike me as funny that the mover couldn't figure out why anyone would have books. There are lots of different types of intelligence -- and some days I'd give up a couple hundred books to have more spatial intelligence.

A doorway to imagination

Or a doorway that attacks in the wee hours of the morning.

Hmmm, what a quandary

I suppose - as one of those horrid generalizations - it really is a matter of how one was raised and which factors tempered their views and perspectives in those years. Someone who had always been taught that one must make a living by hard work and labor, would probably be less inclined to spend any free time reading. A fellow like the mover perhaps never had the leisure time to develop an attraction to literature.
My own addiction to reading probably stemmed from my physical condition in early childhood; the doctors thought, on at least three occasions, that I was at the end, all before I turned six, and so a large number of weeks of my early life were passed propped in bed or a chair, immersed in the worlds and creations of authors. Consequently, to this day I love reading, but would be totally worthless at moving someone's bookcases for them, or holding up an anvil while the local smithy's wife dusted the floor!

We are a family of readers...from families of readers. We all have books in our hands, by our beds, on the coffee table all the time. I can't imagine life without books. We started our kids reading so young, they still think going to Barnes and Noble for an hour is a great outing! My earliest memories are of the joy of a stack of new Nancy Drew books at Christmas!

All I can say is:

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I love books, too. I have a basement full of them!

In the last year or so, the rate at which I acquire books has outpaced the rate at which I read them. I was talking to a friend last night who has the same problem, and we decided that a temporary apocalypse would present the ideal opportunity to amend this discrepancy.

David, that sounded like a real "duh" moment.

Why have books?
To read them!

Why have food?
Something to eat.

Why have a radio?
To listen to it.

I'm not looking forward to the day I decide to move out of here and someone asks me about my hundreds and hundreds of records, mostly 78 RPM records.

"Why would someone your age have all those records?"

I think it's pretty obvious, don't you?

Johnny -- A temporary apocalypse would be useful for so many reasons; I hope it happens soon.

Julian -- I am similarly useless when it comes to practicalities of life, though I do not have the excuse of a frail childhood. I'm just clumsy.

I have boxes of books in the garage. In fact I have every book I have ever bought. The question is one my wife asks when trying to make room out there. Why keep all the books?
I just can't get rid of them for some reason, they are like gold to me. So it may not be about reading at all, but why keep everything you have read?
I never have a good answer to that......... ;-)

One wonders what he thought the bookcases for if he hadn't noticed the books.

I am sure the movers thought you were a terrorist... all those books were for building stuff! bad stuff!

I know people who think bookcases are for candles and pictures and should not be cluttered with books. (I keep a double row of books on each shelf and stick an ornament in front of them)

The last time I moved, I let go of an entire room full of books and brought only my favorites. (I used to read a book a day and kept them all) As I sorted through the collection to decide which I would bring, I was surprised that some of my choices were not the most popular, or even always the hard covers. I brought the ones that I read repeatedly, and that feel like friends or helpers.

I purged all my books to the local library about 3 years ago before a major move. Since then I have been pretty much on the road. Now that I am again settled pretty much into a 'permanent' residence, I have found myself re-buying many of the books I donated back then. Ohj.

Hurricane Isabel came through in 2003 and I lost a lovely collection of books. LOve your books...they may not be there tommorrow

I moved this summer myself. Most of my boxes were filled with books. In process I downsized many things in my life, except for my books. They have become a part of me. Places that I have been and places that I have yet to go.

Everytime I move I let go of some books, some have been with me for over 30 years and travelled across the Atlantic and back. I cannot imagine having all the books I have ever read, it would be impossible to move..too expensive, they charge by weight.

10

Worked with a woman for a few years who passed through our fiction stacks every day to get to her office. One day she took it upon herself to assist a patron at a time when no one else could lunge to stop her, and bellowed out across the library, "Where's the FICTION?"

She also came into my dept. once (cataloging) and asked disdainfully, "What are all these books for?" -- about the shelves of books waiting to be cataloged. Later she stopped one of my staff in the stairwell to ask what on earth we did all day.

She aaalso informed me once when we were in the staff kitchen together that she was going to put some water into a Tom & Jerry glass. I told her I was happy for her. I wasn't, not really, but it seemed polite.

*ahem*

So --

What on earth do you do all day?

Not that.