Tom Prince shares about he became an avid reader.
Reading has always been a struggle for me. As a youth, I avoided it as much as possible. By the seventh grade, I had somehow avoided reading a single book. I was and am an exceedingly poor speller. In school, Round Robin reading was a shameful experience for me and a painful one for my classmates. It’s the practice where students take turns reading aloud from the same text.
Though the paragraph I was to read always remained standing, I was left battered and bruised by the sharp jabs from shifty spelling patterns and the heavy blows of anxiety. In eighth grade, I was required to give a book report. A considerate librarian suggested a book about a boy who lived in the mountains with his family.
While hiking, he found an abandoned bobcat, or perhaps a puma, and he raised it. There was a rock that jutted out from the mountainside that had a grand view of the valley below. The boy, and his now beloved companion, came to an overlook and the puma jumped up on a prominent rock and began to survey the valley- CRACK. A rifle fired and the bullet struck the puma.
What??? I was shocked that the animal I was starting to love was shot! I dropped the book and looked around. The sun had set. I checked the clock feeling like I had read for maybe ten minutes, but over an hour had passed!