This is the answer of question number 4 in the common application question which goes like "Describe a place or environment where you are perfectly content. What do you do or experience there, and why is it meaningful to you."
Reading a book, for me, is like choosing a perfect dress for a fashion expert. One can find all kinds of book, but choosing a good book to read is a tedious job. I don't choose a book by its cover; rather, I choose a book from its first fifty pages. The first fifty pages of a book give me an insight on how good the book is.
When I choose a particular book, the first page that I read is the book blurb, which, ironically is the last page. After I am done with the blurb, I slowly and dramatically turn the book around. Doing that makes me feel like an obsessed archaeologist opening a newly discovered treasure chest. Then, I open the cover.
The first page inside the book is usually the introduction of the writer. I look at the writer's other works and make a mental note to search them out if I like this book. I read about the various awards that the writer has won (if s/he has won). Winning awards doesn't necessarily mean that the book is good but it is more often the case, and has a higher probability of passing my book test.
After the introduction is over with, I start the first chapter of the book. I make my way to the first fifty pages of the book slowly and all of my concentration is devoted into understanding and enjoying those pages. When I am reading those pages, I lose consciousness of my surrounding and I enter into a world of the book. I have skipped my stop many times while reading a book on the bus.
Finally comes the time of the verdict. If the book captures my imagination and I want to keep on reading the book, then it has passed the book test. If not, I return the book to the library as soon as I can, and borrow another one, and my book test is repeated all over once again.
But when a book passes the test, and I am fully devoted in reading it, I feel exactly what the character feels. That is when I attain "nirvana" and I feel absolutely content. My mind is shrouded in a veil of tranquility but my emotions are always at play. I have lived the life of Atticus Finch and ensured that justice has been served. I have fallen in love, gone to college, played in the Champions league final and even committed a murder; I have garnered experience of many lifetimes in 17 years with the help of different books. My personality and my behavior are also shaped around the current book that I am reading. Coming back to reality after finishing a book is really hard for me. To control my mind from being needlessly obsessed over the finished book, I treat myself with another book.
The feeling I get while reading a good book is unparalleled and I could even go on reading for a full twenty four hours (only if my mother forgets to call me for meals.)
Saugat, you need to revise the essay you wrote in full because it did not respond properly to the essay prompt. You spoke of an activity rather than of a place or environment. Being a voracious reader myself, I can go on reading for hours as well and get lost in the written word. However, that is not an environment nor a place. In order to make this essay work using reading as a basis, you need to set the environment and place in a library. From there you can develop your essay to suit your reading activity.
For example, you can explain that you feel perfectly content in the library because of your love for the written world. Describe the feeling you get when you are among the hard bound books. Transform that world for us into a place where you find peace and contentment as you travel through space and time through the books that you read. Develop the idea that you find a sense of inner peace as you dive into the quiet world of the library, where noise is non-existent and your imagination can soar without limits.
Basically, you will have to take us into this abstract place in your mind that can only find a life and manage to exist within the confines of the library and your reading activities. When you manage to do that, the essay will finally work using reading as a part of the essay :-)
