Booksnake
Sunday, October 14, 2012 @ 4:43 PM | 0 comment(s)

Maybe you know by now how much I appreciate the invention of books – particularly novels – more particularly fictional novels; how much it would enthuse me if ever someone would pop out of nowhere and offer me a library of awesome books without asking for anything back. I know that’s impossible because books are expensive and people just don’t pop out of nowhere, but it doesn’t hurt to wish. Anyway, I decided to dedicate this particular blog post to my bookworm alter ego, not for the reason of having nothing to write about (well, a bit of that is true), but because I want to promote reading in my own little way (even if it isn’t Books Appreciation Month). Every advocacy or Public Service Announcement I make for my major is about the essence of reading and how genius books can be, so think of this as a write-up slash tie-in of these projects.


A lot of people I know aren’t so much keen about reading. And it’s bewildering. Maybe I’ve been living my life believing that reading is essential and should be patronized by everybody, so I guess I find the idea of not reading so sad, so sad to the point of feeling lifeless. And I know I’m exaggerating a bit in here, but seriously, I don’t get people who don’t like reading. I read this quote once saying, “Everyone is a reader, some just haven’t found their favorite book yet.” This is probably true. But then how will someone find the best book if they don’t start looking for it? Patience and risk-taking are virtues, my friends.


I remember when I was young, my grammar utterly sucked. I liked keeping journals – journals, not diaries – and I tried to write in English as much as possible, but it was so bad that it was already hopeless. Back then I already did a bit of reading, but I read cheesy romances in small volumes with ravished-looking women on the covers. And I remember how much I enjoyed them: the stereotypical characters and their burning love for each other, the scenes that had 90% chance of possibly occurring, the total description up to the smallest detail of every intimate scenes that had somehow made every reader uncomfortable. I enjoyed reading them (embarrassingly enough), until I met these series called The Sweet Valley. I don’t recall how I got my hands on them, and right now I don’t also recall what the stories are about (it was like a less-censored Gossip Girl, right?). That was around a decade ago. After that moment, I never read pocketbooks again. (I’m such a hypocrite.)


“What really knocks me out is a book that, when you’re all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it. That doesn’t happen much, though.”
© The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger


And that was how my Bookworm Life started. I don’t have a list of everything I’d read because I actually have bad memory, but those that I do are in my Goodreads list. The first novel I’ve read that actually made a mark in me was Where The Heart Is [by Billie Letts]. My mother actually forced me to reading it one summer so I wouldn’t be all statue-lazy in those dog days. It took me the whole vacation to finish it; I was such a snail-reader, but it was good that I was slow because I wouldn’t have loved it if I finished too soon. I wound my way through its pages; got surprised with all the surprises, felt the pain of the protagonist and the protagonist’s baby, was happy with its ending. It was all there; it tugged my heartstrings.

After that, I read books from time to time, touched them little by little. It didn’t go like I shut everyone off because my life was all about books. No, please. I was young and my friends were crazy and high school was crazier. I was preoccupied with a lot of things, with a lot of Mathematics and equations, with boys, with fitting in. I wasn’t the all-out bookworm that I am right now. I didn’t spend much time reading… until I realized how awesome libraries are (a.k.a. the moment the school administration changed the librarian) and how reading makes me excel in our English class. I got back into my bookworm self and read the Harry Potter series like mad.


When people ask me why I’m engrossed with reading to the extent of not having a social life anymore and becoming weird as the weirdest characters, I find it hard to give them answers. Maybe because I have this feeling of constant isolation, and the only way to make me feel less alone is resorting to the company of books? Because I sometimes find crazy situations in books worth embodying? Because fictional guys are hot, sarcastic, sweet, fictional guys? Because I learn grammar the easy way? There are a lot of reasons. Just like in being in love, passion for something doesn’t really have reasons. You just like doing it because you do.


Whatever the reasons are, I’m glad that I found reading and am influenced by the amazing authors’ amazing minds. I’m grateful that I have friends who understand me when I suddenly blurt random words that only Nephilims or wizards have an idea about. I’m so thankful for the Rotaract Reading Corner, a small space in our college library that houses books, books, books of all genres. Thank God humans were given the ability to read and understand literature. I hope each one of us will find our favorite book soon, so we’d experience new worlds and meet new characters we’ll certainly love to live in and want to share your weirdness with.

← older / top / newer →
a woeful & chaotic diary since 071409