A few years ago I decided to switch my “ponderings” blog to a poetry blog. Now I find myself wanting to ponder again from time to time. I suppose that’s the way we are as human beings, or at least some of us. We live in cycles, seasons. And seasons change in some form or another. So here I am again, a pondering poet. Perhaps my poetry friends won’t be too disappointed that I sometimes feel the need to write long, lumbering paragraphs and maybe others will find something worth reading or thinking about in some of my ramblings.
So here’s my “ponder” for the moment. Someone told me this week that many people were purchasing my novel, not to read, but just because the money goes to fight cancer. She said friends had confided in her that they ‘just don’t read’. I am truly, from the bottom of my heart thankful, that they are making that sacrifice, that they have a heart to make a stand in the fight against cancer. But I am also saddened. Not because they’re not planning to read my book, but because they confessed that they DON’T READ…any books…at all! That’s like knowing how to drive but choosing to always call someone else to come get you when you want to go somewhere.
I can’t imagine my life without books, without imagination, not the kind you get from logging on the internet or watching a youtube video or the kind you get from watching television, but the kind that is born in you as you read a story and those characters become so real as you imagine them. When you read a great story, something marvelous happens, you enter a world that can never exist any other place, your imagination. I fear that real honest-to-God imagination is on the endangered spieces list. Great stories, reading, is what turned me into a writer. I think it may have turned me into an artist. I learned to go places, to see things that I could never see if I depended on the media to do it for me via special effects and news coverage. Yes, reading does require effort, but the rewards are amazing.
However, I’m assuming that if you’re reading this blog you are a reader and therefore, I’m preaching to the choir! So, maybe I should say, “Thank you for being a reader, for engaging your imagination.”
lovely reflections,
Glad to see you view life in deep meanings..
best wishes for the year.
Merry Christmas.
Let me know if you wish to be part of poets rally week 35.
😉
Thanks, Jingle,
every now and then my thoughts run deep and other times they’re no deeper than the dust on an OCD housekeeper’s coffee table. haha.
Yes, I would like to participate. I’ll send you a poem link and do my best to visit the blogs of at least 18 other poets this week. Thanks for reminding me.
When we moved to Key West, we decided not to subscribe to cable, or indeed even have a TV!! I have read more great literature and spent more time talking to my husband in the past 6 months than I have in the past 6 years!! I’m loving Lee Smith….
Oh, Lisa, I LOVE Lee Smith, too.
My favorite one of her novels is Fair and Tender Ladies. Also, I love the works of Sandra Kring, especially, How High the Moon. She is most known for the Book of Bright though.
the world would be a much better place if t.v. hadn’t been invented..