Write Something Worth Reading About

The details are a little sketchy but the story is true. On my tenth birthday the gift I received from my parents was Wilt Chamberlin's autobiography - his first one, not the one where he claimed to have slept with 10,000 women.

"I can't believe you wanted this," my mother said.
"I really, really, really wanted it," I answered. "I can't wait to get started."

Yet I still was too young to read such a book. I loved Wilt. I loved reading, and so my mother presented me the book in 1974. It was the heaviest book I'd ever held in my hands, and I read it very quickly the first time through, and the second, and the third. I still have it in my room filled with books, and I've resisted the most recent urges to pick it up again. But a couple of things came of it.

1). I can remember asking my mother what 'screwed' meant. As in Wilt and a teammate went back to the girls room and 'screwed' them.

"Skip that part," Mom said.

2). That book started a habit that has lasted thirty-six years - a habit of reading at least 20-25 pages of something, every single night, before I can close my eyes. There have been a handful of nights - grey goose, jameson fog nights when I haven't met my goal - but for the most part...book after book after book.

My love for writing was born of that obsession for reading, and I bring all of this up because I was reading a great novel last night - God of Animals by Aryn Kyle - and I was within 30 pages of the end. The book was hauntingly good on each page, and I wanted to get to the end last night, but I fell asleep holding the book open. An hour later, I was still holding the book in the same position, but knew I was beaten. I set it down.

Six hours later, I was awake, and I read the conclusion and was not disappointed although the book's end ripped hurt my wounded heart a lot.

And I thought of Aryn Kyle and even Wilt the Stilt and considered the effect that their words had on me, and I thought of it in the context of some of the things I've tried to do with my own words.

It was always just about touching a reader, you know? Somehow, someway, it was always about that ten-year old, or that 40 year old or that 70 year old holding the book until their eyes drooped closed. The proudest I've been is hearing from a reader, who tells me I've had such an influence.

And 36 years later I've learned the meaning of screwed in all of its contexts, I suppose, but the exciting part about it is that there are so many other things I don't know the meaning of.

I have 12 unread books in my closet, the bounty of the Barnes & Noble gift cards that I get as presents (the gift I still really, really, really want).

I can't wait to get started.

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