Lure of the books

As a child I loved to be alone; play with my dolls or build mud houses, I don't remember having played with anyone till I was eight or nine! Even then it was with my sister's friends, but then I made my first friend,(I felt thrilled!) her name was Molly and she was one year senior to me at school. We bonded mainly because we went swimming together. I don't remember what we talked about, but I do remember that we used to hold hands and walk all over the club where both our parents were members. She was the one who egged me to develop my interest in books. She was an only child, so her bedroom was a kids delight, full of foreign toys and Enid Blyton books! She made me borrow books from the library. At first I did it to please her and to feel as grown up as my father or sister (Who always pretended to be grown up from the moment she was born!) but then slowly I got addicted to them. I went through all the Enid Blyton's at a rapid pace; varied my menu to Nancy Drew, Hardy Boys, Three investigators and the usual fare, children those days used to devour. We parted ways when I was in sixth and I lost touch with her, now I wonder what happened to Molly? I don't even remember her surname!


My love affair with books continued and I went on to do literature and enjoyed every moment of my five years at the University. But those five years were serious years. I strictly forbade myself unconsciously to read any 'non-classic' books ( I know now, I lost out on a lot of good reading!) But this was the time I became a thinking reader rather than a pleasure loving one and the training helped me to appreciate books at another level and gave me much more satisfaction and insight that I had before. It made me more critical too. I realised then that I had slowly become critical of everything, not only books, I felt I had the power and the strength to criticize without doing any internal assessment of myself. Oh! well that is the pride of the youth ! I forgive myself now for it and I forgive a lot of other young people around me
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These days I am re-reading books that I read in my youth and childhood (even the Enid Blyton's) Believe me, though I finish them much faster than before, I appreciate them two folds!Thankfully I have a family of book lovers so that when we get transferred from place to place, though there is a lot of stuff thrown away, no one ever suggests that the old yellowing best friends are ever given away! I hope they last till my days on earth come to an end and are cherished by others.


I haven't been able to get certain books that I would love to get ( I dare not mention their names for the fear of being laughed at!) So I tried reading e-books..... But the pleasure of lying on your stomach with your legs bent at the knees and up, with a packet of chips or a plate of sandwich is not there neither is the smell of  freshly printed pages nor the musty smell of old pages tantalize the nostrils! It is no fun to move the mouse when you can use your fingers to flip the next page. But life moves on and the new generation may never know the real pleasure of a paper back but they would have created their own entertainment and who knows their degree of happiness may be more than ours!


But those who read this please take the time to give me your experiences of reading as feedback so that I believe that I am Normal and not experiencing the feelings of a loner that I was.