turning page after page

I'm bouncing back and forth between two stories... and I've never been good at reading two books at the same time.   Technically... I'm not reading two.  One is on CD keeping me company on the way to and from work and the other has good old-fashioned pages.  Eric keeps asking are you done yet?  Both were due back at the library yesterday.... and it seems that when he is "off duty" from real police work, he takes on the role of the library police. 

I tease him about it, relentlessly... but truly, I love that we are a reading family.  All four of us. 
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I feel like I have always loved books... always.  The stories, the pages... the adventure.  Oh how I longed to ride over the prairie in a covered wagon, or solve mysteries with Nancy Drew, and I will never stop laughing over the messes that Amelia Bedilia gets herself into.  Never!  I can still picture the elementary school library, and racing (without running) to the corner where the Amelia Bedilia books would be... and if, of course, there were any left on the shelf, my smile would be a mile wide. 

When I first met Eric, he was not a reader.  But somewhere along the way to falling in love with me, he also fell in love with books.  Maybe it was the time he spent in the tiny book shop on the main street of my little town, or maybe it was the late nights keeping watch over the harbor, trying desperately to stay awake for his shift... whatever the motivation, his love for reading has been an example for our kids.

Laura was a couple of months into kindergarten, I bought her a couple of little first reader books.  The cat sat on a mat kind of books, hoping that we would read them together, and that she would eventually learn.  But she took the two books, sat right down and amazed me by reading them from cover to cover. Every word.  And I'm not sure she has ever stopped...

And Cam?  Oh Cam...
I would swear that he loved books from the first time he ever held one.  Love, loved, loved.  He would turn page after page, and his eyes would pour over the pictures... and sometimes we wondered if he was following the words.  I remember one day I had to bring him along to a class I was holding... and he sat in the corner with baskets and baskets of books and entertained himself for over two hours.  I will always be thankful for that love that was planted in his heart.  It had to be that love that kept him going when the words seemed all jumbled up to him and his classmates were moving onto chapter books.  I will never forget the day it all clicked for him.  Never.  I was driving through Washington DC, and he was in the backety-back seat of the van with a lap full of Garfield comic books... and all of a sudden, there was a burst of  heartfelt laughter!  I asked him what he was laughing at and he replied I'm reading!  So there he was, reading at last, and there I was, crying in the traffic.  Garfield?  I will always love you. 

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I press on with my two stories... hoping that I can get through them before he asks again are you done yet? 
I'm thinking that I might have to come up with the money to cover the fines.