Why Do I Read?

As a kid, my mom would always encourage me to read. I read, yes, but it was never really anything that I did regularly. In fact, I really don’t remember much of what except that I read books like Judy Blume’s Super Fudge during elementary school or parts of Dante’s Inferno during high school. Nothing really stuck with me or had a huge impact on my upbringing. I really didn’t start reading, extensively, until I decided to pursue my degrees in English and literature. Since then, I’ve read something, in some form, everyday.

I’ve always viewed myself as a slow reader, which has hindered my ability to read as extensively as I’d like to read. However, my speed has increased over the years, allowing me to read more. Over the past few years, I’ve tracked my reading with apps. I started with Good Reads a few years back but migrated to Story Graph sometime last year. These apps have helped me keep track of my reading habits and have provided me with a way to save books that I want to read sometime in the future. Ultimately, they have caused me to think about the fact that no matter how many texts I want to read I will never be able to read them all.

At this point in the year, I’ve read 46 books, not including articles from news outlets, academic articles, comic book issues, and more. That means I can assume that I will read about 72 books during 2023. If I extrapolate that out, I will read 720 over…