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I Like to Read

Jerome David Salinger. Jerome? To say you've read all of Salinger's books is not as outrageous as it sounds. As far as I know, there were only four "books." I own them, and have read them.

It was Mr. Arrington who got me started back in 7th grade. Apparently he recognized some latent creativity in the book reports I'd turned in by the halfway point in the school year, and my "reward" was to be chosen for the advanced reading group. For the rest of that school year it was my fate to be the only boy from the class in the advanced reading group. The "girls" group. I guess we matured more slowly back in the '70's because my only thought was not that I would get to sit next to Pam every day, but that I would no longer get to sit with Scott and Andy in the back of the room and make noises, and pretend not to be interested while Mr. Arrington read aloud to the class.

Fact was though, I was interested. Desperately so. Not in Pam, not yet, but in this new found something inside me that happened when I read something 3 years above my grade level. But I couldn't let Scott know that, or he would give me shit the next time I slept over at his house and we were pretending we were Jim and Pete from Adam-12, (Scott always got to be Pete because it was his house)and were staking out his older brother's tree house trying to catch him and his 10th grade buddies doing whatever it was we thought was so mysterious when we were only 12. Turned out it was weed, but I didn't know that then.

Mr. Arrington encouraged me to read "Catcher in the Rye, " which I had to hide from my parents because it had a couple bad words in it and they wouldn't approve, although I doubt they'd ever heard of Salinger, because he was not a "Christian" author, and if any activity wasn't "of the Lord" then it didn't need doing, but that's why I should be seeing a therapist now, instead of sipping Jim Beam but that's a story for another time.

So from this planted seed, grew the desire to explore Salinger further and by the time I'd gotten to high school (still in advanced English, although I can't do math worth a damn and was always scheduled into basic math) I'd bought and read all his books.

As much as I admire him as an author, what I really admire is his ability to disappear. Salinger is known as much for his reclusivity, as his writing. Maybe even more so. As my goal in life has always been invisibility, he's my hero. To have the means and method to withdraw from society sounds like heaven on earth. To be left alone. To be famous enough to disappear. I don't remember that as a choice on the ASVAB, which my 12th grade counselor insisted I take. Guess he just didn't understand genius when he saw it.
SmartKat · 56-60, F
When I was in kindergarten, we had three reading groups in my class. The group I was in consisted of just me and one other child - a little boy named Henry. We were reading above grade level.

I sometimes wonder whatever happened to Henry.
Samedeepwater · 61-69, M
I'm impressed. I don't remember much about kindergarten except fingerpainting with one of my dad's old shirts worn backward as a smock.
jim44444 · 70-79, M
[i]Catcher In the Rye[/i], I never did like that book. I got turned onto Charles Dickens in 9th grade. None of my friends shared my fascination with his works.
Samedeepwater · 61-69, M
And even as an English major, I was never a huge Dickens fan either. Always found him a bit tedious for whatever reason. But then again. I've always been more of a fan of the postmodern.
SmartKat · 56-60, F
@Samedeepwater: I didn't especially like Dickens myself. And (forgive me) I was never that into Catcher In the Rye. Sometimes Holden Caulfield got on my nerves to the max.

In 11th grade, I did a big term paper for English class on F. Scott Fitzgerald. The same year, I did my history term paper on Prohibition. I guess I had a 1920s theme going!

 
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