i love you, learning

It's not a secret I like to read. I always had my nose in a book as a child, as an uncomfortable middleschooler, highschooler, college student. Some of my favorite memories are the ones I share with a good story. Even as an adult, I still love to read.

B is not a reader. He doesn't enjoy fiction and doesn't understand really why anyone else does. "Why would I read something that didn't happen?" He thinks of fiction purely as a made-up story. Something false, not real, pointless. He will happily read a book about real-life WWII accounts, military explorations, etc - but when it comes to fictional classics, he turns up his nose.

I've been stumbling over this idea, trying to see his point. Fiction to me is always more than just a made up story. There are many facets. You identify with characters, find morality, ethical situations which stimulate your mind to think of the bigger picture. You don't just read it and throw it to the side. Each story sticks with you somehow. You see the characters as people - the inner workings of each makes them human.

It is not merely the story or a "Once upon a time, here's the middle, now the end, what did you learn from this?" It is so much more than that. It's not only an escape from reality, but a whole other world you're living while staying planted in the physical.

I love reading. I love the critical analysis that comes with it; finding the little nuggets the author has hidden for you to find. When I look back to high school - I don't think I was stimulated enough. I had to learn to find those things on my own in most of my English classes. Because some of my fellow highschooler's weren't at the top of their game my teachers would let me sit outside the classroom and read ahead. Most of the time the teachers had to read aloud to the class just to keep their attention. I am both thankful for this, and sometimes resentful. It is because of this I read as much as I did. But it is also because of this I didn't get to dive in as deep as I would have had I gone to a better school.

I guess this is why I get so enamored with people like John Green who seem to have such a strong understanding of literature. We never had to read Catcher in the Rye in high school, but after stumbling upon John Green's youtube video about it - I am inspired to read it and youtube along with his pseudo English lesson. It takes me back to my comfort zone - the happiness I felt when I was stimulated in English class (heh, heh.)