Don't Dress Your Six Year Old Like a Skank

Everyone has always been amazed at how much I read. Not just how MANY books (although I can and do jet through them) but how I have the TIME to read. In high school, in college, as a new mother, as a working woman and now as a middle-aged (sigh, yes, only about half a century more to go) woman, people still ask me how I can read so much. A friend loaned me a book she had checked out from the public library, knowing how much I had wanted to read it. She reassured me that there was still a couple of weeks before it was due. I returned it to her two days later. Read. Finished. She walked away, muttering to herself.

So, how do I make time to read? Let me ask you a question. How do you make time to BREATHE??? OK, point taken? I have to read. It's not even an issue up for discussion.

And what am I reading? It depends on the day. I am probably the most eclectic reader you will ever meet. I like any genre, as long as it is a good story. MUST be a good story. (Do movie makers today know what a good story even is? I think they forgot the concept a long time ago.) Good stories are not easy to find. But not impossible.

I recently read "The White Masai", by Corinne Hofmann. I didn't even realize this was a non-fiction book until I picked it up at the library, but it is the true story of a white Swiss woman who travels to Africa on vacation and falls in love with a Masai warrior. They exchange a glance on a ferry and that's it. She leaves everything in her old life behind to be with him and live his unbelievable, incredible life with him. I can't imagine doing some of the things she does from living in a mud hut to cooking over a fire to battling a variety of serious illnesses in the African bush, including malaria. When I went to the Internet to confirm the author, I found that they are making a movie from this book - and there is also a sequel. If you are interested in a fascinating glimpse into a completely different way of life, check this one out.

Now, if you saw a book on the new shelf in the library called "Don't Dress Your Six-Year-Old Like a Skank", you would pick it up, wouldn't you? Me too. And so you should. It's hilarious. It's by Celia Rivenbark, who apparently writes a newspaper column and has a couple of other books. It's a slice-of-life kind of book with chapters titled "If It Ain't on Ebay, It Ain't Worth Having" and "Something Stinks and I'm Pretty Sure It's Tonya Harding". She is a Southern writer so there's lots of laugh-out-loud Southern humor.

So, what are YOU reading?