This is a great example of why I think the common argument that schools should teach “fun” books is flawed. For many people, the thing that turns them off books is not some poor choice of books (“if only the school had taught better books I would have become a life-long reader!”) but it’s the act of teaching itself. Some people just don’t like school!
To be clear: that’s okay with me! Not everyone likes school. I loved pretty much every book I read as a kid, and this would have been true with or without school. But I don’t expect everyone else to have the same experience.
Yes. Just like I don’t feel the need to monetize all my hobbies (because then they aren’t hobbies they are jobs), I also don’t need to socialize all my hobbies. I do some things just for myself. I walk in the woods almost every day and that’s lonely too but I don’t think anyone would question that loneliness as a bad thing
(Well, to be fair, I do have my dogs with me in the woods. But usually I also have my dogs with me when I’m reading.)