Literacy Narrative

              The first book I ever learned to read was called Snack Attack. It was a pop-up book with images of various animals eating other animals. This was not as cannibalistically inappropriate as it seems; for the twist at the end of the story is that all the animals are actually animal crackers being eaten by the ultimate carnivore: a little boy. I do not have very vivid memories and recall this only because, in an act of nostalgia, I ordered the book on Amazon not six months ago. I've always remembered Snack Attack, but little else about that time is clear.

             I do not recall the age. What age do kids learn to read? I cannot even recall if I was an early reader. In my mind, several fragments remain: a Kindergarten teacher with a name like my own—Mrs. Chicarelli—and The Letter People, but I don’t know for sure if this was the same time. A teacher is absent, so maybe this is pre-kindergarten. Pre-school.

During my Snack Attack phase, teachers are absent, but my parents are there. Every week--so indulgent--there I am sitting on the recliner, hideous brown afghan wrapped around me, practicing reading aloud from Snack Attack to my parents. I knew that reading aloud to others was the mark of a learned person because I watched my mom read to her third-grade students during take-your-daughter-to-work day. I learned to admire writing from the movies, painting from Bob Ross, and reading from my mom.

            How many times did I have to read it out loud until I said everything perfect all the way through? I remember tripping over the word “the.” Who knows how long it took, but the evening I did it, I remember applause. Even my brother, never one to share the spotlight, joined in. No doubt that day marked the beginning of a lifetime of seeking my parents' approval and praise. Sometimes reading can be unhealthy.
            Throughout elementary school, reading remained an important part of my life, though mostly as a means of trying to impress people. "Wow, you read Little Women in the fourth grade?! It must be your favorite book, you've checked it out 10 times!" 
            No. 
           But I pretended I had read it, enjoyed it, understood it. Truthfully, I was more content to read the Bailey School Kids, but I knew that thick books impressed people. 
           The need to impress people didn't last forever. As I became more literate in other things, like teenage angst, I drew away from trying hard in school. I preferred to be in the average English classes than the AP. My high school experience can be described as "okay." I did alright in high school; I excelled in college. College was where I learned that to write I needed to read, and to read I needed to write. It wasn't about impressing people--having others make remarks about you. It was about saying something--important things--yourself.
            When I recently received Snack Attack I did not experience the meaningful trip down memory lane I expected. The book is small, short, and anti-climactic. The words are sparse- it is a picture book. This was the first book I learned to read? A pop-up book with maybe 8 sentences? How pathetic. Now it sits on the bookshelf at my parent’s house. It is interesting to me only for considering why my mom threw away Snack Attack but kept my brother’s 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea pop-up book. My mom’s reaction to seeing the book again after all these years mirrored my own: a brief chuckle, a flip through, and then…So What? Is she supposed to remember her grad student daughter mispronouncing “the”? Everyone starts somewhere.