robertv3

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/11/23/opinion/thankful-libraries-books.html

My own first time in a library was when I was around 7. Our town didn't have one. One evening my dad took me along with him when he drove to the library in another town 14 miles away. I was allowed to choose a book to take home.

I loved to read fiction up until I was about 30. Now I'm more particular and it has to be either good nonfiction or really good fiction.

Now I have to both read and write (because I'd find it hard to live without reading and writing -- few things are as satisfying), but it doesn't have to be fiction. It doesn't have to be books either, because now there's the internet. Libraries are the most pleasant and innocent places I know. Now that I'm no longer so entranced by fiction as I used to be, I dream of that big library in the sky where I can somehow feel as good as I did as a child when I enjoyed reading fiction so much.

Addendum: One of the most satisfying books I've ever read was _Have Space Suit -- Will Travel_ by Robert Heinlein. I read it when I was 14 and have been reading science fiction ever since. _Have Space Suit -- Will Travel_ is written for young people but it's still good even now upon re-reading. I don't always like Heinlein nor some of his ways of thinking (Republicans might like him more), but he sure could spin a good yarn.