I love reading old books.  I love the yellowing pages that tell a story all of their own.  As I read, I often get swept away in imaginary lives of people who have held, who have read, the book that I am holding.  How wonderful it is to think of who they were and what was going on in their lives as they took time to read this book.  How did they react to what we have both read?  We’re they shocked… amused?  Which side of the moral line did they lean towards and did they laugh at all the parts that make me laugh out loud?

I picture a mom, taking time away from her kids to enjoy a good story.  Or a college student reading to sharpen the mind.  I can see their faces and almost feel their hands as mine, holding the same book.

I see a stain on the edge of a page and wonder if a table was bumped resulting in split coffee.  The cover is torn – was this book lovelessly thrown in a backpack or the back seat?

It’s not just the story within the book that I love, it’s the story the book itself keeps as secret.