I had a blessed childhood. I lived with my extended family in my grandmother’s house, and she’s the person who taught me to read — taught me to read in a very amazing way. Even though she was a teacher and there was plenty of paper at home, she taught me to read by writing words on the earth, with a stick, as we walked around our farm. Whenever there was something that caught my attention or that she knew was of interest to me, she’d spell the name, and she’d tell me that. And so, in a way, it made reading so organic and so related to nature, to the outdoors, to the world, that it’s — it was fascinating.
And I’ve written about this, and I won’t tell you now all these stories, but I do remember when she taught me the word for “rose” in — in a way to teach me the letter “r” and how she wrote it in her cursive with a little — with a little loop up there and told me that that was a rose that wanted so much to see the world and was climbing the wall of the garden because of the wonders that exist in the world outside.
And I can even remember her voice right now. And I was only three years old, but it impressed me so much - that idea of seeing the world, that it’s something that stayed with me. The love for roses also stayed with me, and the love for words.
But I must say that before learning to read, I learned to enjoy words. My mother used to sing me all these old, ancient, medieval ballads to put me to sleep, and I loved listening to these words, some of which I understood and some which I did not, but which had such a resounding charm to me. And my grandmother used to sing me verses that she put her own music to. And my own father, who was not very musical, he would still sing me songs.
And all of these words I kept during the day, and I kept remembering them. I memorized them. My grandmother taught me poem after poem that I memorized when I was very young, so finding them in books, then, was a revelation. It was like, “I can hold on to them; they are here, for me.”
But the love for words was essential, and it began so early.
