Seeing my first book in print and holding it in my hands for the first time was a dream fulfilled. Having a part of my life available to the reading public helped me to know that it would be shared as another part of the human experience, and that was almost as wonderful as having a child to carry on my name and values. It made me feel more connected to the rest of the world than anything before.
The lives of others were changed in reading my book by their being reminded of their own childhoods as dormant memories came back to bring joy, tears, and laughter through scenes and characters from their own pasts. There are things from childhood that we all carry into adulthood. Being young, naive, and full of awe for a while is something we all share, whether or not we’re aware of it. We are all related by virtue of being human, so we appreciate more the scope of writing and the fact that love, hate, jealousy, fear, wonder, and hope have not changed so very much over the past 5000 years, any more than the human face has changed in that time. We continue to learn from each other.
Almost everyone knows the amazing story of Helen Keller, who as an infant was rendered completely and permanently blind and deaf by an awful fever. Anyone who cannot read is imprisoned in a similar dark silence, horribly limited in his or her communication with the world. Books provide passageways of light that connect us through all of human history. Helen’s teacher Annie Sullivan released her from the prison of her affliction by giving her the gift of language and teaching her the skill of reading. By reading, we find other voices that help us discover our own voices in a world where we are bombarded daily by other media telling us what is beautiful, what is not, what to buy, what to think, and who to be. Reading gives us a wider view and helps us to find our way a little better through what the poet Rupert Brooke called, “...the pain, the calm, and the astonishment, desire, illimitable.” Reading is the key to every door that might otherwise remain locked or even undiscovered. The benefits of reading are without limits.
