Read your way to glory

    A couple of decades ago, one fine day, when we  as a family set out to clear up a dilapidated store room in our ancestral home, did I find a wooden trunk in a corner.  Filled with curiosity and at the same time the fear of confronting lizards, asked Appa to open it. I was dumb struck to find the whole trunk full of books. Stacks of books that were hand bound with pages gathered meticulously from weekly, monthly magazines over years.  The aroma of old vintage paper filled the room and my mind with equal intensity.  Learnt later that,  the treasure trunk was the result of unrelenting efforts put in by an aunt for the love of reading.

A very casual reader that I was  until then, was totally taken aback by the patience and effort someone could put in for the sheer passion of reading.  My inquisitiveness got the better off me and I started  flipping through a few pages of almost all the books.  Those few hours I spent in that room were indeed life changing.  Appa asked me “Why don’t you take up reading seriously?” and I did.

 Gradually, over the years, I realized that reading with passion is altogether a refreshing experience. It is a self sculpting art. Books open up the doors to a whole new world, new experience and can be extremely rejuvenating.
It dawned on me that there can be no best friends like a good book. One can become totally oblivious to the external world, when involved in a conversation with the author of the moment.  It’s an intense mental conversation between two people, the author and the reader. Some books give you a lot of strength, some happiness, some make you ponder, some leave you devastated, some change your thought process. Some books can be so impactful that it changes the way you live.
     The whole experience of reading a book can be compared to visiting a crowd free temple, pray your mind out and return with an uplifted, clearer and a saner mind. Opening a book is synonymous  with entering a  temple. As you flip through the pages, you realize that it works like a therapy, making you forget your worries, transporting you to a different world .  Every book leaves an imprint making one mentally richer.
I would be eternally thankful to that unseen aunt of mine who sowed the seeds of knowledge deep inside me, for I would not be here writing this piece of article for a book that has enriched my life in more ways than one.
      And now, to all those who haven’t started yet, “Why don’t you take up reading seriously”?