Story for the Week
My love of reading started with a warthog and a kiss.
Wait…that doesn’t sound right, does it? 😀 Let me start over.
My love of reading started with A Kiss for a Warthog by Wende and Harry Devlin. Published in 1970 when I was all of four years old, I received my copy in a box full of books given to me for Christmas by my Aunt Jean and Uncle Ron. I don’t remember any other book that was in that box, but that one stuck with me. And almost 50 years later, I still smile when I think about it.
The book is about two feuding towns, Oldwick and Quimby. Oldwick had a warthog in its zoo. Not wanting to be outdone, the mayor of Quimby ordered a female warthog named Allegra from Africa. But when she arrived, Allegra refused to leave the boat until she got a kiss. I won’t spoil the story by telling you how Allegra got her kiss, but suffice it to say, there was a kiss. There had to be, right?
I LOVED that book. So many years later, I can’t tell you why I loved it. I just know that I did. And I know that’s about the time that I started to love to read, and I never stopped.
Growing up, I spent a lot of time visiting the library. My mom was a stay-at-home, and we only lived a couple blocks away from the library, so she would walk us over to pick out books. I would check out five or six books at a time. (I think I read every edition of The Boxcar Children and Nancy Drew.) And I can still picture the librarian who seemed so snooty to me at the time. I thought she was so old, although I’m sure she was about my mom’s age. She had short platinum blonde hair and black-framed glasses. She looked at me as I set my stack of books on the counter to check out and said, “You know you only get these for two weeks.” But my mom had my back (as mothers do) and said, “She’ll have them read by next week.” And I always did.
I would read for hours, especially in the summer. The bedroom I shared with my sister had a corner that I could sit in, between the dresser and the foot of my bed. I considered it MY corner, and it was my reading corner. I could sit there the whole day, and as the light faded, my eyes would adjust, until my mom or dad would come in and turn on the light for me. And when I had to go to bed, I would hide under the blanket with a flashlight because I could never get enough.
I still can’t, and I want to share that passion with anyone who can relate to it. This will be stories about reading and about books that I’m reading and maybe even about the books my friends are reading.
So join me under the blanket…and don’t forget your flashlight.
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