A love of reading.
One thing that I just adore is to give the perfect gift. Whether it is something someone mentioned ages ago that they forgot they wanted or the exact thing they never knew they wanted but now will not be able to live without, I want to give it to them. So far in my marriage, I have done pretty well, if I do say so myself, at giving perfect gifts to my husband, even with his birthday and Christmas only two days apart. But for his birthday one year, I gave him one of the best gifts ever.
Douglas L. Callister once said, “If we know the books located at the bedside, we know much about the man.” Next to Joseph’s bed are mounds of books. Novels, textbooks, collections of essays, and even books about books. Piles and piles. And not just books. Magazines. Articles. Newspapers. There is much by this bedside to tell of this man. I am not allowed to touch this sacred tower of tomes. Heaven forbid I mess up the “organization” of the chaos.
So for his birthday two years ago, I purchased the perfect gift for him. It is called a reader’s night stand and I purchased it from Brookstone. It was on back order, scheduled to ship a month after his birthday, so I was just going to have to tell him about it on his birthday so he could anticipate it until this treasure arrived. Not the ideal situation for a perfect gift. It makes it not quite so perfect. However, to my surprise, it ended up arriving two days before his birthday! While he was at work, I assembled it and then hid it in a closet where he wouldn’t find it. On his birthday, I brought it in to our room while he was sleeping and put it near to his side of the bed. Don’t worry, I didn’t dare put my life in danger by presuming to take his stacks and arrange them on the shelves for him. Near the side of the bed was as close as I could safely place this gem. He was thrilled. It really was the perfect gift. Over the last (almost) two years, the books placed on these shelves have changed from time to time, but it is always full to overflowing, with the excess spilling onto the floor and nearby dressers and shelves.
The book shelf I bought for himJoseph loves to read. So do I. We both spend much of our time reading. We almost never watch television and rarely watch movies because the excitement of turning the pages of a good story to find out what happens next almost always seems more inviting. We read some of the same books, and each of us read some books the other would never be interested in. My favorite reading we do is reading out loud together. Since we have been married, we have always had a read-aloud selection somewhere in the library collected on my husband’s side of the bed. Over the last five and a half years, our choices have included the following:
Two-Part Invention by Madeleine L’Engle
And Both Were Young by Madeleine L’Engle
Small Rain by Madeleine L’Engle
Severed Wasp by Madeleine L’Engle
Wrinkle in Time by Madeleine L’Engle
All Creatures Great and Small by James Herriott
Bridge to Terabithia by Katherine Paterson
The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkein
Wayne and Elna (a family history of my great-grandparents – my dad’s mother’s parents)
King of the Wind by Marguerite Henry
Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas
Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy
Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes (our current book)
We also read to our children. I read to them. Joseph reads to them. And, as mentioned in a recent blog post, Joseph also is sharing the wonders of The Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder with them before they go to sleep at night.
However, the most magical thing of all is that they love reading on their own. Funny enough, neither of them actually knows how to read. That doesn’t stop them. They are intrepid in their literary pursuits regardless of ability to read the words on the pages. They read books from our extensive children’s book shelves, they ask to check out books from the public library, and Austin has started pouring over Calvin and Hobbes and Baby Blues and laughing hysterically at whatever stories he is telling himself as he looks at the pictures. When they go to their room for a time out, and I come to let them know they are finished, I often hear the response, “Just a minute, I have to finish my book first.” In the afternoon they have to take a rest for about two hours. Matthew starts off reading and usually falls asleep. Austin reads for the full two hours.
And one of the sweetest things I have witnessed when checking on my children at bedtime, was the following scene (it actually happens with both children fairly frequently):
A love of reading is a heritage we received from our parents. A love of reading is now a tradition established and shared in our small family, young and old alike.
1 comment:
I love that picture! Rest time was a tradition at our house, too, mainly because I needed it so badly. But I think that's when my kids got the habit of reading. And I'd love to have your nightstand by my bed!
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