Monday, April 16, 2012

Day 103, April 16

"Reading makes immigrants of us all. It takes us away from home, but most
importantly, it finds homes for us everywhere." -- Hazel Rochman.

A writer friend sent this to me, knowing it would resonate with me as it did with her. Reading links us in unlikely and unexpected ways.

Not too long ago, I received an email from a man in Syria who had read one of my Chicken Soup stories, complimenting me on it. We will never meet, but words brought two disparate people together.

I will probably never be a corporate executive, a counter terrorism agent, or a ballerina, but I've read books with heroes and heroines in all these--and more--professions. Books have taken me from the Antartic to the Big Sky country of Montana, from Bolivia to Italy, from Alaska to Alabama.

I was, indeed, an immigrant. In reading, I became, for a few precious moments, a native of those places.

This I know for sure: reading is a passport more valuable than any officially issued piece of paper.

1 comment:

  1. Oh, and so much more economical!

    Right now, I'm reading Atlas Shrugged and Moby Dick. I'm at home on the industrial railroad track and the Pequod all at the same time. I can slip in and out of them as I would put on different shoes. Some books are like slippers, and I go back to them frequently. The scriptures, of course, but also A Christmas Carol, which I read every Christmas, but also in the middle of June, just because. Hmmm. That last sentence was a doozy. Looks like I dipped into the comma box and sprinkled liberally over my writing. Typing. Whatever.

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