RLs Dream

Day 49: RLs Dream and Other Good Reads

Remember how 200 years ago hardly anyone could read? 

Giving away ones we've read.
Keeping ones we haven't, and
Calvin & Hobbes

Is the ability to read a good novel a precursor to successful relationships, financial stability and professional success? Should I be harassing my kids to put down their iPhones and pick up a paperback?

Or are they just getting smart in ways I can't even predict or understand?

When I was a kid, people worried that t.v. was stupefying us. There were studies showing that kids who watched too much t.v. were dumber, fatter and more lethargic. We didn't know much about brains at the time, but people talked about brain hardwiring and how t.v. was going to change it forever. We were going straight to hell in a handbasket, all because of Scooby Doo.

My younger kids, who read books voraciously, have been replaced by older teens with fewer screen-time restrictions and more texting, cute cat photos and Clash of Clans. I read that kids now actually read much more than kids used to read, but they're reading thousands of phrases like "Indiana Jones and the Bad Hat-Shop #BadPrequels" instead of entire novels. 

Anyway. For the stuff project, books are starting to feel like cheating because it takes only a moment to sort out the keepers. A lucky thing, too, because in the next 48 hours I've got to hem a seven-layer crenoline and silk prom dress, work two full days, attend a Greenhills School Shakespeare performance, and have a Cluck Ole Hen rehearsal. Oh, and buy a car. 

And it's raining.