A true reader

Did you ever know a true reader, a kid who read all the time? That was me. Throughout my youth I carried a book everywhere I went, and I had half-finished books stashed at each of my frequent haunts -- the car, the living room, my best friend's house, etc. I sat in the back of the class and read until the teacher took my book away and locked it in her desk drawer alongside the confiscated Walkmen and Rubik's Cubes. Now that I think about it, reading was a sort of compulsion for me.

Today was the first day that Izzy threw something approaching a tantrum: he arched his back, writhed, tried to throw himself to the floor, and produced a type of crying I'd never heard from him before -- inconsolable short bursts of loud dissatisfaction. This outburst ended abruptly and completely just as soon as he got his way. What caused the tantrum? I was trying to nurse him, and he wanted me to read to him.

He has enjoyed looking at books since he was about three months old, but he was never this adamant about it. All today I couldn't take him anywhere near his bookshelf without his pointing at it and making insistant noises. (Unfortunately it's right next to the chair where we nurse; thus the tantrum.) And as of the last few days, he's demonstrating strong preferences for certain books; I believe this is the mark of a true reader. Previously he would listen to whatever book we chose, but now if you try to read him the wrong one he'll take it from your hands and throw it to the floor! Then he'll point at the stack of books until you try another one. I guess we're getting to the point where he'll select his own books; tonight he grabbed Craig's hand and set it on top of The Wheels on the Bus (Zelinsky pop-up version).

His enjoyment of books is personally gratifying -- why is it so exciting that I see a little bit of myself in him? -- and it's a thrill to see him expressing his personality and developing his own tastes. On the other hand, today I read the same handful of books multiple times, and I'm already sick of them. How am I going to make it another two or three years (at which point I assume his tastes will change)? As a children's librarian I used to scoff at parents who seemed shellshocked by their children's need for repetition. After all, I'd been reading Machines at Work at storytimes for ten whole years -- how could they complain about reading it for just a few months? But now I see there's a big difference between reading a book 120 times over the course of ten years (once a month) and reading it 120 times over the course of a month (four times a day).