When we sold all our possessions I gave away in three grand sweeps nearly 15 thousand books. My home library was an eclectic mix of well read books covering hundreds of linear feet double, triple stacked. A true hoarders mess.
I live on a boat so now I primarily read from my Kindle or kindle app on my phone. It makes it easy to track my reading. For 2022 I finished 143 titles with a handful of hard copies added to the mix. I also listen to audio books. Especially when driving. Bibliophiles will claim those don’t count as books. F’em.
I get asked if I read now instead of writing. It’s an interesting question. I actually read more when I was writing daily. Devouring books nearly daily. I still write but never publish and have considered gutting my blog back to half a dozen pages. I am sure Irony is a thorny crown of controversy.
For all I’ve accomplished in life I feel meh. Don’t take that as false. I am in fact happy. I overcame a lot. As a barefoot, dirt road, child of the dirty blue collar class. My father was the uppity one in our clan with a steady job. It doesn’t change the poor education I got. The lack of grammar, spelling, and other writing education. I struggled against social and personal imperatives of stay fat dumb and happy my entire life.
A bag of M&Ms, a Dr. Pepper, and a two knuckle book (three inches thick) was how I survived as a kid when we lived on the boat. Asimov, Burroughs and later Niven and Card would entrance me. With the winter condensation off a leaky hatch dripping down my neck I would huddle in my bunk living on other planets with wild beasts. The conundrum of keeping pages dry was not lost on me.
As a Marine a cop and a business leader I took the wisdom of pages and forged experience into the tools of success. I read everything written over a century of mass market publication. Armed with theory and the experience of others I smashed against the rocks of reality. The horrors of racist and social classism in policing. The terrible excesses of corporatacracy tearing apart society with greedy excesses of wealth. These things smacked me like a salmon of doubt.
The lessons I carried forth from books became actions in the real world. Knowledge and skills acquired page by page became the abilities manifest in real world results. Precise practice produced precision. The siren call of know nothings beating chests hollow with resentment “book learning ain’t real” emboldened me to push further and harder.
When you have a marginal intelligence persistence is measured in perspiration.
Academia was a Fusion Drive accelerating my reading as people gave me books for free. Inhaling the opiate delight of books written across multiple disciplines ironically turned me against academia. As the books published became niche. As the journals rejected new ideas for accepted doctrine. I realized a torpid disease infected academia where iconoclasts were sidelined and belief systems formalized.
Reading is important like breathing is important. It’s that critical to the acquisition of knowledge. Reading broadly is also important. Fried chicken might be tasty but I’d mix that up with a burrito or taco once in awhile. Reading across genres and philosophy broadens understanding and sharpens criticism. Why you disagree should be balanced on an understanding higher than “you’ve got poopy pants.”
This isn’t an essay about book