Married to a Non-Reader

I was reading an article on Book Riot's website - my latest obsession - the other day that a contributor wrote about not dating non-readers and it really made me think. I'm married to a non-reader. Ok, he reads a little bit, like online articles, he's read the Harry Potter books (years ago) and read one book last year (a Halo book). But for the most part, he's not a reader. This article, which you can read here, was about the contributor not being able to date non-readers because reading is such a big part of her life. I completely get it. When I was younger and thought about the perfect guy that I would end up with, I always thought he would love books as much as I did. Clearly that's not how life turned out for me. 

The more I read this post, the more I realized that it's actually okay with me that I'm not married to a reader. Why? Because my husband and I don't have to be the same person. We don't have to like all of the same things to love each other. He absolutely loves video games and has many shelves full of them. Me? I don't like them and have only played a handful of times. But it's ok! He has his things and I have mine. 

I don't mind that he doesn't read because reading is not my entire life. Yes, there are days it consumes me and I don't do anything else but read or look at bookish things online. But there are other days that I don't pick up my books because I'm busy hanging out with him, crocheting, watching tv or movies. He and I play golf together, go workout at the gym, watch Friends and The Big Bang Theory, and just goof off. Ive realized that I have a lot of book friends in my life that I can talk to about books, like my book club friends, my mom, my aunt and uncle who have very similar tastes to mine, some of my co-workers, and the blogging community. It really doesn't bother me that he doesn't read. I don't think it makes him less intelligent or less worthy of my time. 

And what's really great about him - he understands my obsession! He constantly buys me books; he knows that rather than buying me flowers, he can buy me a book because I'm going to appreciate it more. He encourages me to go to garage sales to find cheap books, go to our local used book store. Although he isn't always interested in what I'm reading, he patiently listens to me if I want to talk about it. Honestly, one of my favorite things about this guy is how he listens to me talk about things that I find interesting. Last year I read Carly's Voice: Breaking Through Autism by Arthur and Carly Fleischmann (review here). It was a book that my sister-in-law recommended to me because her son has Autism and so does Carly Fleischmann. I really loved this book - which you can see if you read my review - and it really made me think about how my nephew, C, sees the world. It was so eye-opening and my husband and I talked about it for hours. He hadn't read the book, but listened to what I learned and we both were able to enjoy and learn from it. I could have talked about it forever, but it was the wee hours of the morning and we both needed to work the next day. Regardless, it was so great to be able to share this experience with him, even if he isn't much of a reader. 

I get that some people want to date and/or marry a reader; I thought for a long time that I did too. And I'm not saying that one person's opinion is wrong and that mine's right. But once I met my husband and realized how much we have in common besides reading and how much I love this guy, the fact that he isn't a reader didn't matter. I don't need him to like all the same things I do. I just want him to support and appreciate me for being me, and I'll do the same for him - video games and all.