Reading and Writing: It’s a Love Hate Thing
Since before I could remember I was learning to read and write. Many influences taught me these skills including my parents, older siblings, teachers, and even through my own self discoveries. There came a time in my life where I realized that I prefered writing over reading. From essays to journals, to research papers and lists, I enjoy all types of writing, especially when it is hand written. I am not exactly sure when this time started, but in high school I became more aware of my preferences.
My earliest memory with reading is when I was about 5 or 6 years old. I sat in a big, comfy, brown, reclining chair with my dad in our living room We were reading a story about Amelia Bedelia going to a baseball game. I remember getting frustrated because I would skim over the words and guess what they were saying. My dad would make me stop and sound out each word until I could properly read what was on the page. To me, my dad’s emphasis on proper pronunciation was annoying. Unbeknownst to me, this was probably when my attitude towards reading started to change.
All throughout elementary school, I never really read books. We were assigned to read over the summer, but I never would. My first distinct memory is around 3rd grade. We had to read Hatchet and for our first assignment we were to make a poster of the chronological event in the book. I didn’t read but soon found out that I could ask other students, or even the internet, and they would tell me everything I needed to know without even having to read the book! Once I figured out this little “trick” I realized that I didn’t have to read to get good grades. This attitude has stuck with me since then.
Not reading goes all the way until the summer before 9th grade. Our summer reading book was “”The Absolutely True Diary of a Part Time Indian” by Sherman Alexie. Being Native American, this book sparked my interest and I read it front to back a countless number of times. I annotated, highlighted, underlined, and made notes all throughout the book. I felt like I could connect with Sherman, being that we are both native american. The story was about a Native boy who left the reservation to go to a white school, I connect to this because I am half white and have to find a balance between the two groups. In general the book was well written with enough vulgar humor to keep you on your toes.
Now that I am in high school, my reading experiences just keep getting worse. I started off the year strong by doing the summer work, but once we moved on to the next assignment I started slacking off again. My freshman year I had a teacher named Mr. Furtek. He looked like Albert Einstein, was super fit, and coached boys soccer. He was really a great guy, pretty funny, but was stuck teaching a remedial class full of sophomores who failed english last year, and me. Nobody was interested in the class and nobody ever paid attention. Because it was a lower level class, we had a few easy books to read that we just listened to on audio tapes. Even though I know what the books were about because we listened to them, I didn’t technically “read” any of them. I was in the mindset of not reading so sophomore year, again, didn’t read any books. Junior year, however, I took AP Language which I loved. This class was way more writing based, in fact, we were only assigned 2 books. Second semester senior year was fast approaching and I needed to figure out what my new schedule was going to be. Period three I had an open block and asked if i could use it as an independent study in the library. They denied me because I already had 2 woodshop classes in my schedule and those were considered my independent periods. The only class that still had openings was journalism with Mr. Kehrl, who primarily taught eighth grade english. I tried so hard not to be in that class but ended up being stuck there with all sophomores. At first I hated it and resented Mr. Kehrl. About half way through the class, when we actually started writing and publishing articles, I realized that I loved it. This class taught me good writing skills through a variety of different writing styles and topics.
From early on I knew that I was better at writing than reading which has influenced my literature life. Reading to me has always been a chore that I dreaded. Now I realize that being a fluent reader and being able to comprehend writing pieces is essential for becoming a better writer. I used to pretend that I would read so I could be considered a mushfake.
Reading and writing are part of literature and go hand in hand. Even though I dislike reading, I still like to write. Some may argue that you have to be good at both but I have gone basically all my life with only actually reading one book, so I disagree with these people. To me, reading is like sitting in the passenger seat of a car, but writing is getting behind the wheel and taking control. I have a passion for writing and love the creative freedom I get from it. Throughout my journey with literature I have realized that I need to find a balance between reading and writing. During my college career I am going to break my bad habits and start reading more, which in turn will improve my writing in the long run.
