He Made Me a Reader

I just got this picture. He is very young. Seven years old. Hard to see him in the picture. The man I knew. The powerful, demanding man. Was he really this young, ever.

He never graduated from High School. He dropped out, lied about his age and joined the Coast Guard. Headed for sea. Went to Alaska. Crewed on ice breakers and manned lonely light houses. Personally I never saw him read a book. Partly due to my bed time. Partly due to the hours he kept. Partly due to the way he was.

But he made me a reader. My mother gets credit as well. She was the visible example. She was always reading. Still does. My father had lots of books. Never saw him read. Too late to see it now.




I became a reader in Chicago. I must have been a second grader. I went to second through fifth grade in Chicago. Eisenhower Elementary. Kennedy was killed while I was on that playground. I always came home for lunch. I always smelled the school food being cooked. I never got to eat there, but that is another story, another time.

I became a reader because my father read Jack London's The Call of the Wild to us at night. Bit by bit. As only he could have read it. My father had the Alaskan accents down. He knew the talk. He knew the words. I mean knew the words. Had heard the words. Had seen the people. He knew what they were saying. He had seen the Wild. Heard the call. And he passed it on.

That Spitz.. she be one damned she devil dog