Grateful Because

The written word is amazing.

What started out as oral tradition became written. And the magic is that it worked. The written word invoked the same emotions, the same imagery, the same touch, the same reality.

Copied by hand the written word maybe did not touch more people at first but it touched farther. And then, through print, it touched thousands, millions, billions.

And me.

I grew up with books. A religious family mine, books were everywhere. The Bible, a concordance, Bible studies, Billy Graham, Corrie ten Boom, so much more.

That was the first tasting of.

The real taste came in the form of one of the books from the Bob Evers series by the Willy van der Heide, given to me by a primary school teacher as a price for good hand writing.

It went unread. Until I got ill and needed 6 months of bed rest. With day time television limited to Wednesday and Saturday afternoon, I finally read. The complete Tintin comic book serie my brother-in-law owned that is. And after that the complete Asterix comic book serie. Only when those two were exhausted and I was left with nothing I turned to the Bob Evers book.

And then the second volume.. and the third.. and…

And it never stopped.

Some of my fondest memories are of my scouring through the public library, hunting for more books.

Some of my fondest memories are books.

I lived many more lives than I have time for thanks to books. I have experience unheard of — thanks to books. And I have unheard of experiences thanks to books.

Thank You for the written word and our wonderful ability to absorb it.

* the amazing photo work of the book cover was taken by Scot (PhotoNoob.net) who worked on the photo in PhotoShop.