When I was a kid, I loved reading more than breathing. When I started kindergarten, I didn’t know the alphabet, and I was put in the “lower” reading group. Before I started second grade, I was reading the 176-page Nancy Drews. My first was The Ghost of Blackwood Hall. I’ll never forget it! Thus began a love affair with reading. We’ve been on the outs from time to time, books and I, but they’ve been an almost constant presence in my life. Given this, I suppose it shouldn’t surprise me that my 2-year-old is a book worm. Really, though, I didn’t think it was possible for 2-year-olds to be book worms. Please don’t misunderstand me. L cannot read. She does not even know her letters (other than “I,” the first letter of her name). But she loves books! Really loves them. She will happily page through a 700-page book. Yes, you read that right. Her favorite activity is to make a big pile of 10 or 20 books and look through them one after another. She likes nothing better than to be read to, and she loves going to the library more than any other place – more than the playground or the mall or a restaurant or a museum. She would go to the library twice a day every day if she could.
I’m not sure how I feel about this. There are great things to be gained from reading a lot, such as a large vocabulary, knowledge, good grades, and so on. However, I want L to love other things as well – biking, swimming, being outside, to name a few. Of these, she is not such a big fan. She used to love tricycling, but her interest has waned as of late. She enjoyed swimming in Hawaii, but she’s not been a fan at all here in cold WA’s indoor pools. She used to love going to the playground every day, but she hasn’t been interested in it lately. I can hardly blame her given the miserable weather we’ve been having, but still.
Anyway, I guess we’ll see how things develop.
