A Book Is an Open Door
Doors are very powerful things. Things are different on either side of them.
Dianna Wynne Jones, Howl’s Moving Castle
The best kind of people are the ones who gift you books (the worst are the ones who make veiled Frozen references in their blog post titles so you end up with annoying songs stuck in your head for the rest of the day).
Because I’m trying to make up for the latter, I tend to buy books for birthday presents. And I try hard to surround myself with people who gift me books because those people will have a positive effect on me…and also because it benefits my reading addiction problem.
Probably mostly the latter.
Book gifters are wonderful because, with their gift, they are allowing you to travel through time and space from the comfort of your couch. They’re saying, “Here’s a book! Walk through it—who knows what could be on the other side?”
A book is a door that takes you from one place to the next, that opens up another world or another time or another point of view. Books can take you more places than an airplane ticket (or a time machine—because they don’t exist yet—thanks for nothing, Einstein) and for a lot less money. And you don’t have to pack your suitcase or check your bags or squash into a seat that was not designed for your ridiculously long legs and inevitably has another human squashed in next to you, breathing down your neck and making small talk.
No, you open the book…and with a little imagination, you have been transported into a different reality. And then, when you close the book, you’re home again, but with (ostensibly) so much more wisdom and knowledge and perspective than you had before.
It is the best magic trick ever.
This week alone, I’ve been to South China in the early 1900’s, modern day Harlem, the moors of fantasy England, a brewery in Minnesota, and dystopian Appalachia…and I went there in my pajamas with a cup of tea.
But I love the literary travel even more when the book has been suggested or gifted because then it’s like one of those novelty travel agencies that plan your trip for you without telling you where you’re going to go. As you’re traveling through the itinerary someone else devised, you wonder “What were they thinking? Why did they pick this? How did they know I needed this?” So, you see, you begin to learn not just about where you are going, but also about the person who has sent you there.
My mother gave me the book set in South China—as I read, I saw again her love for Jesus, her passion for sharing the gospel, her prioritization of people over possessions. I know her well, and her book suggestion showed me more of her beautiful soul.
On the flip side, a still-relatively-new-to-me friend suggested a literary novel set in the kitchens of the midwest, and I saw the beauty of her character as I turned the pages, her love for quality, the fineness of her mind, her thirst for growth. It was a door into not just the author’s world, but into a deeper understanding of my friend. I learned as much about her during my hours reading the book as I did in our hours together—just in a different way.
Two different women gifted me two very different books and I was able to travel through the door not just to see new places and meet new characters, but also to see the giver with fresh eyes.
You can’t say that for just any gift.
So here’s my challenge for you. What book could you read that might help you walk out of your own every day and into a different world? What book have you read lately that can give you something to bring back through the door after you’ve come back in and latched it? What book can you share with a friend that might help them see you or themselves or the world more fully?
Books are very powerful things. Things are different on either side of them.
Hold the door open for yourself and for someone else.
