Day 13 of 31 Days of Simple Praise to Yahweh

I do not remember learning how to read.  I do not remember my father ever reading to me.  I remember only once my mother reading to me.  I do not remember my Grandma reading to me either.

But always there were books around me.  Our entire hallway upstairs was built in bookshelves, I can see them now in my mind's eye 6 shelves up filled for 30 feet or longer!  and there were huge bookshelves in the living room and books in Grandma's desk [Even if they were horticulture and that nasty dictionary she said she couldn't live without!]  Oh and then there was the bathroom reading and the bedside reading!

But I first remember Aunt Dede reading Winnie Ther Pooh aloud to my siblings and me.




Then Grandma brought me a gift from the church rummage sale....a book for 10 cents called the Bobbsey Twins at Home.  I LOVED it!  I still have it [though I do have to say it is one of the few book series I really appreciate the revised editions.  I was blind to the racial innuendos as a child but I was uncomfortable reading such things to my children and they did a good job revising the books.]


Next reading memory I have is of a camping trip in the POURING rain in our borrowed canvas tent.  Mom said if we would lie down on our sleeping bags and not touch the sides of the tent [hoping to prevent it leaking] she would read to us.  I loved that.  She read us stories from her copy of The Reader's Digest, probably packed for her own pleasure while we were to be off romping!







This could have been me except we didn't have trips to the library except at school and then we were not allowed on the floor.  But I found out I could work in the library instead of getting teased during recess!  I worked in the school library during 6-12th grades.  And I could still do just this action if you give me a couple of minutes in the library right now!


If I had been born when my Granny lived 1880's I probably would have looked like this....

Somewhere along the way, I discovered books on audio cassette tape, probably for children with a read along book.

But from time to time they looked like this  and I learned to re-thread them and splice them and repair them and play them again.  As a student and young nurse we taped all our reports to the next shift so we learned repair techniques.





But then I discovered full length books on audio tapes!  We listened everywhere.  It united our family.  It stopped any bickering, it calmed the car rides.  We took them with us everywhere and I can remember my children imitating the narrator, "Les Miserables by Victor Hugo, cassette 3 side 1", in a slightly french accent!


















maybe someday this will be me..........





But for now here is my picture!
I am listening to old Fairy Tales at my treadmill.
[And in the car I am listening to a mystery thriller]






I truly am Thankful Every Day for such a simple thing as God inspiring someone to record a book so I could listen to it!