Courtesy of Jamie Pearce
- I've always loved being read to — as a child, I would've had my mom read to me all night long.
- When we were in a long-distance relationship, my partner started reading to me over the phone.
- Now we're married, and he still reads me stories to help me fall asleep.
I turn off my bedside lamp and slide into the covers, tucking myself in and curling up beside a long pillow. I pull it close, snuggle down, and close my eyes, ready for a bedtime story. It's 2013, I'm 21 years old, and I am falling asleep in South Africa.
My long-distance boyfriend has just finished a day of work in Canada; his time zone is some six hours behind.
"What are we reading today?" he asks, his accent sliding over the words, emphasizing each R.
"Your pick," I reply.
"'The Stormlight Archive' it is," he says, and flips open his book.
I blow him a kiss over our video call and plug in my phone. Over the next 20 minutes he reads to me — sometimes a book, other times rugby articles, and occasionally an NHL report. Between his voice, the pillow, and the quiet comfort of a bedtime story, I fall asleep within minutes.
At the end of each reading session, he tells me that he loves me and that he'll talk to me in the morning — or so he says. I've never been awake for the end.
We are now married and still do this routine
Fast-forward, and we've been married for four years. I get to hear his voice in surround sound after he emigrated. When I fall asleep, I reach across to lay a palm against his chest. We alternate nights of him reading with listening to audiobooks.
We are listening to a reread of Robert Jordan's "The Wheel of Time." Michael Kramer and Kate Reading are great, but they can't tell when I'm falling asleep. They can't alter their volume either. And, if I'm biased, they're not as good at doing the different character voices.
My husband studied theater — I'm treated to a plethora of vocal gymnastics. He once read Amy Harmon's "What the Wind Knows" to me entirely in an Irish accent.
We both love it.
He gets to read part of his novel or an article he's been meaning to get to. Chris finds reading aloud therapeutic, much as a script read-through was for him back in the day.
He enjoys seeing me enjoy it, and laughs quietly when he finishes a chapter and I sleepily mumble at him to keep reading.
It's something I've enjoyed since I was little
I loved being read to as a child. My mom used to sing me to sleep or read me fairy tales. I would have had her to read to me all night if I could have. I just enjoyed the stories — it instilled a love of literature that likely contributed to the writer I am today.
Aside from pleasure, though, there were tons of benefits. Research has suggested that children who are read one book a day hear about 290,000 more words by the age of 5 than children who don't have that privilege. Kids love being read to, and so do adults; Pew found in 2019 that one in five Americans listened to audiobooks.
But when people find out that I enjoy being read to as an adult, they think it's strange.
It's no stranger than an audiobook, with the exception that it isn't prerecorded. It's no stranger than guided meditations or sleep apps, where people pay subscriptions to have the likes of Harry Styles, Idris Elba, and Kate Winslet read them to sleep. Many people listen to ASMR sounds and white noise to still their busy minds.
For me, what does it is getting read to by the person I love.
My husband reads to me at bedtime most nights. It helps me fall asleep.
Source: Kalayaan News
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