The memory of receiving my first library card is one I hold close to my heart. I was 5 years old, fresh out of my very first day of kindergarten. My mom had spent the morning making crafts with my new class- parents stayed with us that first day to help ease us into the transition. On our way home we stopped at the library downtown, just as she’d promised in the weeks leading up. I could barely sign my name and didn’t even know how to read yet, but by being brave and starting school, I had earned my very own library card. A few years and a move later, I was the girl that read while walking during recess, blindly balancing on the wooden outlines of the playground. I went on to participate in summer reading programs annually and was hardly ever without a book. My high grades earned me new reads from my parents and as I got older, I attended a few midnight releases. Somehow, senior year of high school snuck up on me. I had such a full plate that I didn’t even have a lunch period. I was still reading but more of my time started going to hanging out with my friends, working, or laying on my bedroom floor having nervous breakdowns over the future.
You’d think that was it, but it was just the start. The end came after I went to college (that is another story, and will be told another time- can you tell what my favorite book is??) I identified as a reader so intensely Before college, but I realized that somehow, I have not read a book since 2015. I used to read a handful of books in a month, sometimes in a week, and now that’s more than the number of books I’ve read since I graduated from high school in 2011. I constantly mention wanting to get back into reading but never start. I’ll buy a book and then let it collect dust on the shelf. In the last few years, I have become a horrible library card owner. I reserve so many books but I either: start and don’t finish them, check them out but don’t even open them, or let the holds expire on the library shelves. Any I do check out get forgotten, and I hold onto them for weeks past their due dates. I always think, “Maybe today will be the day,” but I just cannot bring myself to read them.
In 2019 I was hitting rock bottom and decided to look for solutions. I had so much trouble with new books, so I thought, what about old books? I considered re-reading all of my favorites, thinking that would reignite my passion. After debating the idea with myself I know I’m not ready for them just yet. That, in combination with realizing what I want to do with my life, resulted in this project. I am going to read books I’ve already read, starting from the beginning. I am obviously not going to read every book I’ve ever read, but those that I remember, that I still think about today. I will read books, series, poetry and classics that I’ve; 1. Already read, 2. Started but never finished, and 3. Wanted to read but never did. Every post will include: the info on the book itself, how old I was when I first read it, and my memories of it- what has stayed with me through the years. Upon finishing each book, I will write a current review to complete the post and upload the whole thing to this blog. Once I have finished those books, I will begin a section of new books (and maybe the occasional throwback) that will continue indefinitely- the Epilogue.
I’ve wanted to do this for over three years now, and even though it offered me the potential for everything I want, I still hesitated. I feared that re-reading these books would hurt me more than save me, or that they would lose their magic if I no longer felt the same about them. I am afraid of what I could learn about myself, but I have realized that you can never do anything the first time more than once, and you aren’t supposed to. We are meant to grow and change, to evolve. This project is intended to help me rediscover my literary appetite while finding my voice as a writer. The point is not to be the same reader I was before, because I’m not the same person I was before. The point is to figure out what reading means to me now, what these books mean to me now, and to prepare for a future of reading. This is my metamorphosis.
The Rehabilitation of an Anorexic Bookworm 