Personal Reflections on Reading

My name is Mike Chirinos and I work as a sales manager. I used to be an active reader in my childhood, between the ages of eight and thirteen. I had enough time to read usual things for this age like Journey to the Centre of the Earth by Jules Verne, Jack London's The Call of the Wild or Defoe's Rob...

My name is Mike Chirinos and I work as a sales manager. I used to be an active reader in my childhood, between the ages of eight and thirteen. I had enough time to read usual things for this age like Journey to the Centre of the Earth by Jules Verne, Jack London's The Call of the Wild or Defoe's Robinson Crusoe. In my teens I looked for books with strange and sometimes controversial ideas. I wanted to amaze my friends with original opinions. I looked for the longest titles and the authors with the funniest names; in the library I tried to find books which nobody usually reads. Later, when I studied at the university, I expected to spend long evenings in intellectual discussion with clever people, that's why I started reading philosophy. Professional life was the end of books for me. Books didn't really help in practical work. I didn't stop reading, I read all day, but this was usually news on the Internet, manuals and documents. No books. In those days I only had a book «on the go» during airplane flights or train journeys. And in my free time I usually watched TV. Then, one fateful day, my TV broke. My new TV is inside my computer. It's on a desk in front of a working chair and I can't see it from the bed. I still use it for the weather forecasts and it's nice to have it on while I'm typing... but what to do while long winter evenings? Well, have another go with books. Now, I just like books. I have a pile of nice ones by my bed and I'm reading about three or four at the same time. There are books everywhere and all of them have something to read in them. I have a strange feeling that they've been there all along, waiting for me to pick them up