I never liked to read. I had devoted parents, inspirational teachers, intellectual friends
and myriad influences that you thought would cause an artsy kid like me to pry open
a book now and again. But I never did. It was more of a frustration for me than a passion.

I related this to my brother Doug one evening after years of not reading. He was
an avid reader who had a real appetite for the written word. His house was a library
of sorts. He thought I might have taken the wrong tack when it came to reading.
He pointed out that I had grown up with television. I was visually based. Did I just
figure this out?

I had been influenced by the earliest animators of the day, Max Fleischer
in particular. So why not read someone whose work is full of pictures? He handed
me a small paperback, A Christmas Carol. “You’ll love this,” he said.
He was right. As older brothers usually are. So I tell my friends I learned to read when
I was 26. Mr. Douglas Sheehan and Mr. Charles Dickens both late of this world were
founders of the feast. What a bountiful feast it has been.