Reading demands engagement and is most definitely not a passive activity. A rendezvous with a book demands that you let go of all distractions. Pico Iyer’s essay, The Joy Of Quiet” http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/01/opinion/sunday/the-joy-of-quiet.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=Joy of Quiet&st=cse is a plea for stillness. He says: “In barely one generation we’ve moved from exulting in the time-saving devices that have so expanded our lives to trying to get away from them — often in order to make more time. The more ways we have to connect, the more many of us seem desperate to unplug. Like teenagers, we appear to have gone from knowing nothing about the world to knowing too much all but overnight.” The average American spends at least eight and a half hours a day in front of a screen. The average American teenager sends or receives 75 text messages a day. Iyer’s article— urging us to slow down, to find time and space to think— brought to mind Ed Young’s 1990 Caldecott acceptance speech: “Take Time for "8 Matters of the Heart"
Take time for repose
it is the germ of creation
Take time to read
it is the foundation of wisdom
Take time to think
it is the source of strength
Take time to work
it is the path to patience and success
Take time to play
it is the secret of youth and constancy
Take time to be cheerful
it is the appreciation of life that brings happiness
Take time to share
it is in fellowship and sound relations
one finds meaning
Take time to rejoice
for joy is the music of the soul.
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