Bored? Read.

I have been reading ever since I can remember. When I was little I was reading anything I could get my hands on, whether it was the comics from the newspaper, nutrition facts, or the labels on various household products. I always came home from school with books and they were the first things on my Christmas and Birthday wish list. I was a little geek. The thing is I’m proud that I like to read, because without that I wouldn’t have an efficient vocabulary and I wouldn’t have the drive to write. I thank my parents for putting me in workshops to better my skills, even when I was made fun of for it (not that I’ve ever cared that much.)

I think that people are losing sight of what reading actually is. It is the foundation of everything we know, along with writing. If you do not have the ability to at least somewhat comprehend something you are reading then you have basically nothing. Schools are indeed trying to get kids to want to read, but it’s not working. Television is taking over, and although the Internet has many sources for reading, kids aren’t using it as so unless they’re told to. I feel this is a problem.

Reading is entertainment. So isn’t going to the museum and so isn’t taking a walk and taking in what is around you. People are stuck in society right now. They aren’t grasping what is right in front of them. If I didn’t grow up reading I never would have wanted to read, because there are so many distractions.

Magazines are amazing. Books are wonderful. Articles, essays, poems… they’re all so special and the only way people are wanting to read is by being pushed to read for work and school and so forth. If you open up your mind and realize that reading and using your imagination is a form of entertainment, your vocabulary will expand greatly and everything will just seem so much easier.

You won’t feel empty when you don’t have the computer handy or the television on. You’ll be yearning to go home and finish that juicy chapter rather than beat that level in that video game. I’m sick of people complaining that they didn’t get taught the right way in English classes growing up and that’s why they stink at it in college. It’s not true because you should want it, and you need to want it. It’s an essential, and it kills two birds with one very valuable stone.


-Kassandra