The best thing for being sad.....

When as a young adult I first read The Sword in the Stone, by T. H. White, there was one place in the book which I read over and over again. It so struck a cord in my heart, a deep place of knowing that I wasn't even aware I knew until I read those words:

"The best thing for being sad," replied Merlin, beginning to puff and blow, "is to learn something. That's the only thing that never fails. You may grow old and trembling in your anatomies, you may lie awake at night listening to the disorder of your veins, you may miss your only love, you may see the world about you devastated by evil lunatics, or know your honour trampled in the sewers of baser minds. There is only one thing for it then---to learn. Learn why the world wags and what wags it. That is the only thing which the mind can never exhaust, never alienate, never be tortured by, never fear or distrust, and never dream of regretting."

Reading is what I do when I am sad. It is the place I go to "learn why the world wags and what wags it." Reading takes me out of myself, my worries, my limited perspectives and experiences, my moods and attitudes, and levers me into worlds, experiences, perspectives, moods, and knowledge beyond myself. Reading opens my mind and heart, while somehow sheltering the tender, vulnerable, defensive and sad places there. It is a space holder I need in my life to experience sadness and learn from it, rather than hide from it or hide it from me. Stories, poetry, novels, essays, informative articles, and sacred scripture give me the insights and reminders that I have the inner resources and support to face those difficult things in life.

There are many other reasons I read, besides because I am sad, yet it for this reason that I am most grateful for the gift of books. I wonder in our efforts to lure students (and teachers, who sadly are oftentimes not readers themselves) to reading if we don't rely too heavily on the entertainment value of reading, and not enough on those other values that reading plays in our lives.

What about you? What are the deeper, meaningful roles that books and reading play in your life? What are the different sorts of reasons, beyond those stated in the state ELA standards ( to inform, to entertain), that you read? How might we share what really matters about reading with teachers, students, parents?