Part Mom, Part Dad, all me!(Kevin Hughes) Author's Note: One of the wonderful Writers on StoryStar commented that he learned to love books and reading from his Mother. I, too, learned that way. I realized that a lot of my good choices and actions came from just being like my Mother and Father...so here are some memories. Thanks CPlatt for reminding me that you learn from those you are around the most.
The thumbnail, is a picture taken when my Kathy and I took the kids to see the "The book of Kells", written and illustrated somewhere around 800 AD. We all want to see it for ourselves. So yeah, books rock!
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When I was little, there were ten children at home. We had several dozen magazines laying around: National Geographic, Life, Look, Popular Science, Popular Mechanics, and Time Magazine. There were also a few that were mostly for my five sisters and Mom: Ladies Home Journal, Harpers, and Modern Homemaker. We read those too.

We had three giant dictionaries that had their own podiums! And maybe another half dozen of different sizes that us kids used for school. We had both the World Book and Britannica Encyclopedias- along with a collection of the "Classics" with red and gold bindings. And...hundreds of comic books! Mostly DC - then Marvel hit the Newstands around the very early sixties, and those of who were between eight and ten years old, snapped those up as soon as a new issue came out.

We had "highlight" magazines for every grade , School Newspapers, the Cleveland Press (afternoon newspaper), the Cleveland Plain Dealer (Morning News paper)- we had all of them. Not only did we read them, we delivered the Plain Dealer and the Cleveland Press. I had paper routes all the way through school.

We were, in a nutshell...readers. I thought everyone read. I thought everyone talked about what they read at the dinner table. My Mom and Dad were both college graduates before the Great Depression, which was rare. Both of them were avid readers...and so, by default, we all became readers.

The only rule was simple: unless you maintained a B average in School, you couldn't read comic books. So those of us less gifted academically, had to really struggle just to read a comic book. One of my brother's claimed he would have never graduated from High School, if it wasn't for Superman, The Fabulous Four, and Thor.

Everyone one of us had a Library Card, including my Mom and Dad. Since we grew up in a big city, libraries were everywhere, The Main Library downtown Cleveland was one of the biggest in the world. Four of my brothers and sisters, and both my parents were given the "special cards" that allowed you into the "rare book and manuscript section." Those books and manuscripts were not allowed to be checked out at all. To get that card was a very special privilege. And yes, I had one too.

We all knew the Dewey Decimal System by heart, and could race through a card catalogue with the tiny pencils and a three by five card and finish our search for books in mere minutes. Dad and Mom often went with us, especially if we went Downtown to the Big Library.

We had collections of poetry in big thick books, and Dad or Mom would read us poems after dinner. Not always, but several times a year. So poverty was added to the things we read, or listened too. Both my Parents played instruments, so music was a close second to literature. Sadly I don't play any instruments but I loved listening. My Mother's musical tastes were as wide and deep as their literary tastes.

The only thing my parents were not able to pass onto me was a love of Opera. Never got it. They tried. Carusso was on the record player every Sunday. But it never resonated with me. On the other hand, both my parents loved Elvis's Gospel Music and were indifferent to his Rock and Roll. LOL

Both my children are avid readers, as are the grandkids. So I guess CPlatt was right. We do become our Mom and Dad's in some ways. I now realize that reading doesn't come natural...but if it is always around you, you pick it up. Thanks Mom and Dad! You both gave me a gift I am still using some seventy three years later.

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