I like purple and therefore I am going to write in purple ....
I bought the 'essential DVD collection' from WordMP3 (around $80) and have begun to discover how MUCH stuff there is on there. I decided to start with the ACCS (association of Classical Christian Schools) annual conferences and found myself today listening to George Grant from 2002 waxing eloquent about books. He offers some excellent advice about books and recommends that we make reading a priority in our lives - serious reading - and that we be prepared to read things which challenge us. When I have finished what I am reading currently I shall have a go at Augustine's 'City of God' which I have had for a long time (two old volumes from the old 'everyman' series picked up in two different 2nd-hand bookshops over 10 years ago....). In any case the think I liked best about what Grant said was that reading humbles us. Those who READ know that when they turn the page they will find out something that they didn't know before. Books take us on a voyage of discovery. Recurring themes in my reading are the Holocaust, health-related books and books to help me understand the Bible.
In between these sorts of books I have enjoyed getting inside a foreign culture (Botswana - via McCalls 'number 1 ladies detective agency). I've finished all those now - anyone got any other 'light-reading' quality titles to recommend?
A lady who visited last week commented that I sounded, in our conversation about home-ed, 'very intelligent'. (I am not overwhelmed - she doesn't know me very well....) I pointed out that my formal education stopped at the age of 16 - that I didn't go to University (my mother strongly disapproved and back in those days you needed to have some parental financial support....) . I always enjoyed learning stuff at school and I constantly thought about and asked questions concerning what I enjoyed learning - trying to fit it all together.
Since beginning home-ed 20 years ago I have read loads of books (I wish I had kept a reading journal - I wonder if there is any point beginning such a venture at this late stage...) and have learnt far more as 'teacher' than I did as a 'pupil'.
One person's idea of paradise (quoted by Grant) is an inexhaustible library full of wonderfully-bound books - sounds good to me. On the BBC adaptation of Trollope's Barchester books (tried to read one once but it was so sugary I couldn't bear it...) the dying Bishop says of his impending death and entrance to heaven 'there's so much I want to FIND OUT'. My sentiments entirely. Those who read tabloid papers could argue that they read them because they want to 'find out' but what they want to do is peer into other people's business which is rightfully none of their own - these sorts of things are not worth the effort. But to find out how much of God is manifested in tiny details of His creation; to discover how His unseen hand has upheld and instructed sorely tried and tested children of His throughout time and to see how He has worked out all things to bring maximum Glory to Himself in all places, through all time - now these things are worth finding out about. I guess when I 'know' all I need to know here on earth I can go home and continue learning....