Jake Binenstock
2/5/2014
My Literacy Narrative
“Writing is an exploration. You start from nothing and learn as you go,” (E.L. Doctorow). Writing
has always taken my absolute undivided attention. It is unlike any other type of critical thinking activity.
For those other types of thought processes I am able to listen to music, converse with people, and have
other types of distractions around. Although, with writing I have to find a quiet room, be completely
alone, and focus solely on the task in front of me. The great thing about writing, as Mr. Doctorow said is
that when writing you can start with absolutely nothing on the paper in front of you, and just see where
your mind can lead you to.
As a child I wasn’t nearly as into writing as I was in love with reading. I was incredibly into sports
back then I immersed myself into any type of literature involving sports. I would know each week when
the next Sports Illustrated was coming in the mail. Unfortunately, I lived in Minnesota where the sports
history is pretty painful, but it didn’t matter to me. Anything I could get my hands on that involved
sports was pure gold. Every morning was the same, I would sit down with the sports section of the
newspaper, pajamas still on, eating a bowl of cereal, and analyze the baseball statistics they laid out. I
knew the top ten players in homeruns, batting average, ERA, etc. I would constantly talk to my father
about anything involving baseball. Eventually, I think he got sick of hearing about which player had the
best average with runners in scoring position, and decided to buy me a book that might be semi
interesting to hear about. Of course, this book had to have some sort of involvement in sports or else I
would not have any interest. Due to the limited amount of choices he had, my father went to the sports
section of the book store. This was when he bought me the first book that I absolutely could not put
down. It was a pretty simple title, The Baseball Book, by Tom Verducci. It was pretty self-explanatory.
This book went over all of the great moments in baseball history. I had not been into sports that long so
I hadn’t witnessed many significant instances. That was why this book had such an incredible influence
on me. Each new story I read felt like I had witnessed that incredible moment. It was the first time I felt
absolutely enthralled just from reading text on a page.
Eventually, I finally wanted to read about something else than baseball statistics (not that I was
bored with them). The other type of reading that really caught my interest at a younger age was Calvin
and Hobbes by Bill Watterson. This was just another obsession that was started with the morning
newspaper. I started to venture out of the sports section and into the comics. I absolutely loved the
adventures of this little boy and his stuffed tiger. My favorite part of them was reading the comic strips
with my siblings. Some of my best memories from when I was younger was staying up late, building a
fort, and reading these comic strips for hours on end with my sister. Even as I went through my awkward
teenage years, (I still am) I would occasionally take a look at my old comic strips as a pick me up if I
wasn’t feeling too great. The reason is that I still see the humor in the comic strips. It is weird that some
of my favorite quotes as of now, are from a comic strip I read when I was nine. I like to think this is
because I was an extremely profound child, not a hugely immature adult.
In the past years I have really slowed down on my reading. Although, a few novels have really
had an impact on me. One of my favorite books I have read is To kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. It is
one of the few books that has drawn a lot of emotion from me. It somehow explores the issues of rape
and racism while still maintaining an uplifting tone. It really spoke out to me about the injustice that can
happen in the world, and showed the importance of putting myself into someone else’s shoes. Another
reason it might have had a big impact on me is that it is told from the perspective of a young child,
which helped me connect to it.
Since I have gotten to college I have not had much time to read books that were not assigned to
me. The only reading I have done that has been just for me has been news articles. Growing up, I was
never a big fan of the news. Whenever I seemed to watch the news, it was filled with horribly sad
events. The news corporations do this to get ratings, but I never saw how a bunch of murders were
considered top stories. That was not the way I wanted to end my day, but recently I have started using
reddit, which is an entertainment service website where users can submit content. At the end of most of
my days I will go on reddit to see what the big events in the world were that day, and maybe get
entertained by a few funny animal videos. It is a great way to stay informed without having to be
brought down.
Whenever I write I want to be able to incorporate some of the fantastic qualities I see in each
one of these works. Growing up, writing was always a chore, and something I absolutely resented doing.
Although, as I get older I want to be able use it as these authors did, to escape into your imagination and
explore. I do not think I will ever be able to enjoy writing as much as these authors did, but I think I will
be able to love reading them as much.