Wright 1

Robert Wright Professor Eaker English 1101-017 11 September 2013 Wrights Reading Literacy Journey: A Personal Literacy Narrative Reading Literacy can be described as a journey with mountains and valleys. My earliest memory of this reading journey can be described as something to be desired by a six year old kid. The sun beaming through the open window on a fresh summer afternoon and the voices of neighborhood friends approaching on skateboards and bikes in the near distance. I found myself imprinted and shackled in a seat at the dining room table that I didnt want to be in. Every noise from the slightest breath through the nose, to the gunshots and geese quacking as my brother yelled in excitement I got one!, I got one! he said while playing Duck Hunt. Everything had my attention besides the multiple workbooks that sat in front of me for two hours, four days out of the week during this precious summer. The workbooks were infested with exercises that teach you the difference between a noun, pronouns, and what subjects and adjectives are. I was distracted more so by the thought of the dining room feeling like a jail, even a castle can feel like a jail. Another thought that resonated in the back of my head and may have slipped out of my mouth a time or three Why isnt Kenny [my older brother playing Duck Hunt on Nintendo] down here at the dining room table learning how to read and write? I swear I never seen him read anything besides where is Waldo or gazing at pictures in the Goose Bump series of books. My mother never responded to that questions in word but with a swift smack to the back of the head or a pinch to the arm for being a smart aleck. She would give me a set number

Wright 2

of pages to complete in a certain amount of time. Lord forbid I didnt complete the pages she assigned; that would only bring 3 more pages. Its better to have and education and not need one then to need an education and not have one, she said as three more pages miraculously appeared in her hand. My mother made it her priority to ensure I maintained the level of education I had attained during the previous school year. My mother was a Special Education Teacher at the time. She would buy reading books and writing books from me to work in during the summer. For a while, I thought my mother was punishing me for being the good boy. My Oldest brother was a lost causes; he never made it past the eighth grade and was in jail a year later. My brother Kenny was only two years older than me, he was on the brink of destruction. Running away, skipping school, and getting suspended. He was entangled in the spider web of ADD and ADHD. Every time he misbehaved he would blame it on the fact he didnt take his medication. Some way, some how he got away with it. Throughout middle school, my mother would ask my English teachers to put a summer package together for me so I could have something productive to do for the summer. I am by no means, made or built for sports. I remember pleading in despair to be signed up for football so I could get out of all those summer assignments and reading To Kill a Mockingbird. A few years later I had classified this as my favorite book because it was honestly the only book I read during this period. I couldnt find this book on spark notes; I had to read it. In addition to my mother being a Special Ed Teacher, she was a teacher at the public school I attended. She was very well known throughout the school. I ensured I did my best in all my classes, I didnt want to hear a speech about how to act in public because I had embarrassed her. I remember my seventh grade English teacher sparking up a conversation with my mother

Wright 3

about my reading comprehension and how slow of a reader I was. I found it difficult to comprehend what I was reading, I remember trying to read while the TV or music was on. I would read a page 4 to 5 times and I couldnt comprehend what I was reading. After a long drawn out parent teacher conference stimulated by me not being able to focus in school or talking during class time, the first label that was suggested by everyone to include my mother was Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD); the term embarrassed me. I wasnt going to accept it, I had seen that label as being an excuse as being lazy. Although, I never took any medication and never placed in any special education classes, I still felt like that title haunted me. I knew something was wrong but I wasnt ADD. My mother took a very strong action, she placed me in Catholic School the following quarter. I stayed in Catholic School until graduating from high school. The classes were smaller, so I could get the individualized help I so call needed. By this point in my journey, I felt as if I was in a downward motion; I hated reading, it felt forced. That downward motion would soon turn into and high point. My oldest sister had moved back into my mothers house, her last year of nursing school. One night I was running down the steps through the dining room to get to the kitchen. I dont know what made me take that route, there were two other ways I could have taken to get to the kitchen. I felt a strong magnetic force pulling me towards a place I didnt want to be. I always seen the dining room as a daunting place from my younger years of sitting at the dining room table working in my summer workbook. My sister would utilize the dining room table as a place to study; she left her books out in front of the seat I envisioned myself shackled to so few years ago. The force that was pulling me to the dining room was a Human Anatomy book. I was amazed at the pictures at first, vivid pictures of heart, lungs, and bone structures. At no point while sitting at the table reading the descriptions of the pictures did I feel forced, I didnt see the dining room as a jail cell, or shackled to a chair. I

Wright 4

was feel to get up and leave the table if I wanted; I couldnt. I was intrigued, I wanted more. I remember asking my sister multiple times, Can I read your book when you are done? Somehow after reading that Human Anatomy book, it broke the cycle of every book feeling forced or reading. By the time my high school graduation came around, I was burnt out. I needed a break from all the reading and writing I had done. I joined the Air Force and became an Emergency Medical Technician. Little did I know, the next 6 years of my life would involve a tremendous amount of reading patient previous encounters and writing awards packages for subordinates. Three years into my military career, I was preparing to deploy to Afghanistan for the first time, there was a lot of downtime between training events. I had picked up a book in the lounge of are dormitory titled Alex Cross Trail by James Patterson. The very first page of this book sucked me in with a force I couldnt resist. I think I had stumbled upon my found love for history and mystery based novels. I read that book in two weeks in between training and immediately purchased Private Berlin another book written by James Patterson. I had read 2 books in one month; I was shocked. Reading didnt seem so bad after I had read those books. Once again I had found reading material that interested me. This was the beginning stages of me growing an appreciation of words. I dont find reading and writing difficult. I find it a struggle to read or write about something that arent on the line of history, mystery, and health topics or something Im passionate about. I still read the books that I am expected to read for my college classes, but it takes me forever to read them. I usually have to take breaks in between and I also have to take notes in order to remember what I read. On the other hand I had to read a book, the book was about Woodrow Wilson life and World War 1; needless to say I finished a 235 page book in three days in comparison to 2 months it took me to read 167 pages on Cognitive Thinking. I

Wright 5

know that some books that are assigned to me will be dry and boring and wont spark a bit of interest. I now have an understanding of what I need to do in order to make this process a bit more desirable. I call it a journey because I am still exploring to find my full potential in my reading literacy. I have gained an appreciation and understanding of my reading literacy. Reading is a part of everyday life. We do it without even thinking about it; its inevitable. Your literacy is constantly evolving and the road is constantly expanding to fork in the roads or highways. I cannot say that I love to read books but I am starting to find it much more interesting and less forced as the days go by. While on a reading literacy journey you experience highpoints (mountains) and low points (Valleys). Some journeys may have a lot more valleys than mountains and vice versa. Understanding this will help you stay on the road, its a journey to better yourself. You will one day reach a highpoint and that highpoint with plateau. When reaching this plateau you will gained an understanding of your literacy journey not an end to your literacy journey.